M.J. Scott's Blog, page 41

And now…an interlude from New York

Well, we are coming to the end of my first week of a being a Real! Live! Author! with a book out and everything.  It's been fun and odd and exciting and tiring and a little surreal (especially seeing my book in a bookstore) and I've talked a lot about Shadow Kin and other people have talked about Shadow Kin and said nice things and I'm not sure I can say anything more coherent than that at this point. I'm also wrestling book three into submission and trying to make its plot make sense, so I am officially down to very little brain space for other stuff.

So in order to have something to blog about that isn't book related for a little bit, I'm returning to New York and the second last set of pics from my trip!

On the 5th of July (and honestly, how is that we are so far from July already?), Keri and I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art which was one of my favorite things we did the whole time in New York.  Accompanying us was our lovely agent Miriam which turned out to be a very good thing because the Met is HUGE. And somewhat TARDIS like.  Every time you think you must have walked through the last room, another appears. And they are all filled with very very cool stuff. But Miriam knows her way around and where everything is and saved us from wandering around lost for days trying to find anything.

We went to see the Alexander McQueen exhibit which was amazing but didn't allow photos.  Luckily most of the rest of the Met does allow photography.  Given that Keri and I both write actiony fantasy, we did spend a bit of time with the arms and armor collection but we also saw all sorts of things.  I won't inflict too many pics on you but here's a few of the things that caught my interest.

This is what the Met looks like from the outside (okay, not quite a police box but still deceptive….)

Oh, I miss those blue skies

 

The great god Bes

Watch out, he's all smitey

Egyptian cat

I've always loved the lines of egyptian cat art

Sarcophagus carvings

Can't decide if it's a jackal or a hunting hound

The original Angry Bird

Watch out....

Sekhmets

Four lion headed goddesses are better than one

Graffiti on the walls of an Egyptian tomb

Proof that human nature does not change...

Tiffany window

Pretty!

Knights

I wear armor now...armor is cool!

And armor comes with handles!

Who knew? But I guess you have to get in and out somehow!

Knights also had patterned mail

This looks even cooler in person

And in Japan, some very odd hats (this is only one of many)

Chewbacca wants his hair back

This looks like a steampunk gun but it's the real thing

Where are the matching goggles? And my air pirate?

Another Angry Bird!

Egg stealing pigs need to avoid the Met

Cycladic mask

These were mesmerising. So simple but beautiful.

Okay, back soon when I regain some brain power.  One more lot of New York pics to come at some point.

 

In the bag…

Or at least over at Tote Bags and Blogs….talking about reading loves and giving away another copy of Shadow Kin.

Come on over and tell me what makes your inner bookworm happy!

It's Book Day!

Shadow Kin is out today! Let there be rejoicing (or at least some chocolate and bubbly!)

One of my NY 4th of July pics seems appropriate for the occasion!

It's been a long 19 months or so since I sold and waited for the big day. Thanks to everyone who's been cheering me on along the way (and even beforehand), it means a lot to me. And an extra thank you to Jessica Wade, editor extraordinaire and Miriam Kriss, super agent and my fabbo crit buddies, the lovely lulus!

Now it's time for the book to go out and make its own way in the world.

But first to celebrate, some winners from the blog giveaway. I know I said two copies but hey, three is meant to be an auspicious number, so let's make it three!

The winners are Kim Perry, Shiuli and J. Christopher! Who can contact me via my contact page and I'll get things organised.

I hope everyone has an awesome day today.  I've had a lovely day so far and even though, weirdly, I do need to sleep through part of launch day US time, I shall be partying in spirit!

So close…

About fourteen hours to go until it's 9am on release day in New York. It's sort of a weird feeling waiting for the big thing that, really, I have no control over anymore.

I can understand why writers talk about a book baby. Lots of effort for a long time and then a big flurry of effort at the end and no way of stopping things after that lol And you want everyone to think the result is wonderful! Even though you know some people will think it's a weird looking brat. And that's pushing a metaphor far enough for one morning.

Anyway, I'll draw the blog giveaway and the newsletter giveaway tonight before I go to bed….so if you haven't entered, you have less than fourteen hours to do so!

I'm also at My Bookish Ways today – where I will answer questions etc and there's another giveaway chance.

And Ace/Roc are doing their Fall Giveaway over at Dear Author and Shadow Kin is one of the books up for grabs.

Okay, off to work to distract myself from author neuroses!

The final snippet

Tomorrow, or at least, sometime late tomorrow for me, is release day!

So one last snippet to tide you over. When I was doing the collage for the book, I needed a red headed actress for my heroine stand in. Being an Aussie, Nicole Kidman (too tall and at the time, too blonde) sprang to mind. And then I thought of Miranda Otto (who is also a strawberry blonde). So I went looking for images and found these two….which pretty much perfectly evoke my messed up assassin gal. Miranda doesn't quite look like her and her hair isn't red enough in these (the girl on the cover is actually really close to my mental image) but the mood and attitude I get from these pics is spot on.

I believe these pics were taken by Karin Catt for an Australians in Hollywood exhibition that the National Portrait Gallery in Canberra did.

Sunday snippet

Three days to go! So I gave you a heroine song the other day, so let's have a Simon song today. The first time I heard this song, particularly the first verse, I nearly fell off my chair because it really *is* Simon. So here you go, Superman Tonight by Bon Jovi.

Another snippet

It's late Friday in the US now…four more sleeps until release day. Three more for me, since technically sometime late Tuesday my time is Tuesday morning US time. I have heard reports of a sighting in a Barnes and Noble…so if you're looking for a weekend read and you're in the US, you might just be able to get Shadow Kin early.

Anyway, as part of the continuing countdown…another snippetty tidbit of book info. I've talked before on the blog about doing collages for a book. I use Curio and do an electronic collage. I pick an actor/model stand in for my hero and my heroine. Not because my characters look like that person exactly but more for a mood or a feel of a person. For Simon, my stand in was Jamie Bamber (aka Apollo in Battlestar Galactica amongst other things). I will confess to being a leeeetle annoyed with the resolution of the Apollo/Starbuck arc in BSG, so maybe I wanted him to get his HEA. Anyway, here's one of the collage images so you can see why he's….inspirational.

Not too shabby....

Don't forget…two copies up for grabs over here! I'll draw on release day.

Making like a bandit…

In other news, I'm over at Romance Bandits with the always lovely Anna Campbell today…talking about Shadow Kin and your fave romance pairings!

Come play bandits with me!

A soundtrack snippet

As it's officially September in the US and that means 5 days to go until release day, here, have a soundtrack snippet.

This is Red by Daniel Merriweather. Which is, weirdly, a song for my heroine.

Let's give some books away!

For the last 18 months or so I've been giving away some of my fave authors books while I waited for Shadow Kin to be released.

Yesterday this arrived:

One big beautiful box of Shadow Kin! And that means it's time to give away my own book. Woohoo!

So here's the deal. Right now, I'm offering two copies up for grabs. All you have to do is comment on this post between now and release day (September 6…12 short days away)! Should anything else cool happen between now and then, I might just be moved to increase the loot! (Example of cool things…interpretative dance, photos of SK in the wild given it's likely that some stores might have it before release day, increased in twitter or FB followers, pictures of famous people with my book etc etc….). Easy peasy. Also a little bird told me that there is another copy up for grabs for newsletter subscribers…details will be in the next newsletter which goes out tomorrow (Saturday Aussie time)!

Also, because we've entered the official countdown to launch day zone, I shall be appearing here and there on the interwebs over the next few weeks. List of dates etc over on the appearances page on the site. Book launch details are there as well.