Benedict Jacka's Blog, page 59

Still Away

Out of the country at the moment.  More posts when I get back.

Things I learnt today:  rush-hour traffic in New York is quite impressive.

Discount on US Fated Ebook

I’m travelling abroad at the moment, so just a quick piece of news:  the US ebook edition of Fated is on sale!  Right now you can get an electronic copy of Fated for $1.99, so if you know anyone who doesn’t have the first book but might be interested in getting into the series, now’s a good time.

In other (and rather more annoying) news, the website’s been playing up following a server move.  The main page works, but all of the sub-pages have failing to load.  I’m working to get it fixed – in the meantime, you can still view the most recent posts via my home page.

News for June

Some general bits and pieces:

First, Tantor Media is doing their National Audiobook Month promotion.  MP3-CDs and digital downloads are cheaper, and they’ll be doing a giveaway of my stuff later in the month.  So if you’re looking to get any of the Alex Verus audio books, now’s a good time!

Second, I’m going to be away for most of June.  I’ll set up some posts to go out automatically, but I’ll have limited access to email until I get back at the end of the month, so expect a slower response rate than usual.

And finally, proof copies for Veiled are in, review copies have come out, and the book’s getting closer and closer to publication.  I’ll put up the first chapter extract within the next month so you can read it online!

Ask Luna #47

Long delay with this set of questions. Sorry. Been a busy couple months. I’ll try to get them all done over the next month or so.

From: D

Hello. I have a couple of questions I hoped you would not mind answering.

1. During the Rakshasa wars, who were the Rakshasa fighting, the Indian light council, the British light counsel, (was their a part of the British light counsel that governed India like the British raj) or everyone from the magical world human magical world?

2. was Ravana and Kumbhakarna part of the conflict. ( I know that they were suppose to have been killed by Rama and his army, but they struck me as the kind of chaps who might have a back up plan in case living becomes difficult)?

Thank you.

I’m pretty sure they covered this at some point or other in history class and I missed it – actually, maybe they didn’t, they tend to concentrate on British and European history and forget everything else – so I was just going to say ‘don’t know’, but luckily for you, I felt bad enough about taking so long to answer this one that I looked up Vari and asked him.

According to Vari, the Indian Council had been fighting the rakshasa on and off for thousands of years – there were breaks, but it wasn’t so much a case of peace as putting the war on hold until they had time to get back to it. The Indian mages had a lot more numbers, but the rakshasa tended to get the upper hand by playing the Indian factions off against each other. When the British arrived then it was a three-way fight. The rakshasa did their usual thing and manipulated the British and the Indian mages into attacking each other – it worked for a while, then the mages found out and decided they’d team up and kill the rakshasa instead. Things went downhill for the rakshasa from there.

Ravana was supposed to be one of the old rakshasas – or maybe the original rakshasa, it’s kind of hard to tell since it all happened way back in legend. Like you said, he was supposed to have been killed by Rama, but Vari also says that he was supposed to have been unkillable, so your guess is as good as mine as to what actually happened.

From: Sven

Hey Luna, a quick question can Alex see things that are certain but a long time away? For example, could he see whats going to be on an exam 2 months from now if it has already been written? Thanks

In theory, yes. In practice, tracing a path that far would be nearly impossible. The exam might be fixed, but there’s be so much uncertainty in the two months between now and then that it’d be almost impossible to find a stable route.

At least, with the methods Alex uses. Apparently there are other ones which work better for that kind of thing, but it’s not the sort of divination Alex specialises in.

From: Phillip

Hi Luna! Big fan of your (and Alex’s) work. But a couple thoughts had occurred to me which I really hope are not too … impolite.

The first is about your Curse. It’s connected to the blood right? As in it is past down through the generations from one to the next. From everything shown it is pretty deadly for anyone to get too close to you, physical contact is basically out of the question. So how (and sorry if this is indelicate) do members of your family ever get close enough to someone, to you know, continue the curse? Just seems like keeping the family line going has some big obstacles.

My other thought was about Arachne. I think she is a fascinating individual on so many levels. And I’ll admit that my own inhibitions regarding spiders is playing a part here but I couldn’t help thinking if I was in that cave that she is one very LARGE spider – so, um, what does she eat? It must be an awful lot to support an animal of that size. Or would there be a form of magical sustenance?

Thanks for tolerating the impropriety. I’ll work on some more magically germane questions for next time. All best to you and Alex! (the rest of the group included)

Sigh. Everyone keeps asking that.

Yes, my curse is a bloodline one. Yes, it gets passed down through generations. And yes, physical contact is generally a very bad idea, and yes, for that reason, the women who have it die childless, usually after a very long, healthy, and miserable life, assuming they don’t get tired of waiting and take a short cut. However, the curse doesn’t just go down the family tree, it also goes sideways. So when someone with the curse dies, then the curse just finds the next youngest girl who’s a blood descendant of the curse’s original target. And so on.

As for Arachne, I asked her that once. She said that she used to eat the same way as other spiders. Problem was, she had to eat a lot. I got the impression that she had to not be all that picky about where her food was coming from, if you know what I mean. Anyway, over the years, she developed other ways of getting energy, and she eventually managed to get those to work well enough that she switched over completely. I asked her if she ever missed eating the natural way, and she said no. Which is kind of a relief, to be honest.

Website Update

Now that I’ve got some free time, I’ve spent a day or so going through this site and doing various pieces of long-overdue maintenance.  The Encyclopaedia has finally been fixed (all of the articles should now be linked directly from that one page), the Ask Luna section has had a touch-up, and I’ve cleaned up the pages for the Alex Verus novels as well as adding placeholder pages for the US and UK editions of Alex Verus #7, Burned.  Let me know if you guys find any broken links or pages and I’ll fix them!

Other than that, everything’s peaceful.  Should be getting my edits back in another couple of weeks (whereupon everything will become busy again) but for now I’m enjoying my holiday.

UK Audio Release of All Alex Verus Books Up To Hidden

Some good news for this week!  As my US readers who are into audiobooks probably know, the Alex Verus books are all available in the US in audio format, published by Tantor Media.  However, for my UK readers who want an audio edition, the news hasn’t been so good – the only one that’s had a UK audio release has been Fated.

I’m happy to announce that this has just changed!  As of yesterday, Alex Verus numbers #2 through #5 – that’s Cursed, Taken, Chosen, and Hidden – have been released in audio format in the UK.  You can read the Orbit announcement on their website, and you can listen to samples of all the currently available Alex Verus novels on SoundCloud through the links below:

Fated

Cursed

Taken

Chosen

Hidden

I’m also planning to do some housekeeping and cleanup of this website over the next few weeks – various parts of the site have been somewhat neglected over the past months while I’ve been busy with finishing the last book.  Expect a few minor changes, content edits, etc.  I don’t expect any of the pages to be renamed, though, so any bookmarks should still work.

Time Off and Titles

With Alex Verus #7 sent off to my publishers and beta readers, I’ve been relaxing the past week.

The period after I finish a book but before I get my edits back is the closest I get to a real holiday. Technically I can take holidays at any time I like, just like any other self-employed person . . . the only problem is that while I’m doing that, I’m not writing, which means I’m not producing books to sell, which means I’m not getting paid, which tends to take the fun out of holidays after a relatively short period of time. But after I’ve sent off a first draft, there isn’t really any writing to do. I can’t really start work on the next book in the series until the events in the last one are finalised, so while I’m waiting for the edits I can take a break without feeling guilty about it. (It also helps that I usually spend the last month of writing a book in a deadline frenzy, so by the time the manuscript goes out I’m pretty exhausted anyway.)

So I’ve been spending my time relaxing and working on the giant pile of odd-jobs that have accumulated over the past couple of months while I’ve been writing and neglecting everything else. (To those of you who’ve emailed or sent in Ask Luna questions with no response as yet:  this would be why. Sorry.) Should have that sorted out in another week or two.

One piece of news I do have: we have a provisional title for Alex Verus #7! It’s looking like it’ll be called Burned. This is quite a bit earlier in the developmental cycle than for other books, but then this one will be coming out relatively soon, in April 2016; yes, I know that doesn’t sound like soon, but it’s actually pretty quick by publisher standards.

Okay, off to start work on the Ask Lunas. We’ve got at least a couple of weeks’ worth of questions saved up!

Done

After a solid week of writing and not much else, Alex Verus #7 is done.  Sent the first draft off to the publishers last night.

I’m going to go collapse for a while now.

Still Working

Current status: still writing.

Alex Verus #7 word count: 105,000-ish.

Completion status: still not done.

ETA of first draft: hopefully soon.

Amount of spare time: low.

Amount of spare energy: also low.

Shooting for next week for the finished manuscript.  We’ll see if I make it.

Podcast is Up

Anton Strout has just put up the interview that I did with him last week for the Once and Future Podcast.  You can find it here!