Daniel Waters's Blog, page 11

What I Did Over My Summer Vacation

Part of it, anyway. I went to NECon, a Writers' conference held every summer in Rhode Island. I've been going for a few years now with my pal, the writer and artist Matthew Dow Smith (currently working his magic with Doctor Who), and I always look forward to this event and to get a chance to catch up with friends, meet new people, and socialize with some of my heroes. This year I moderated a panel: "Dark YA Fiction: Get Them While They Are Young". My panel was stocked with talent--F. Paul Wilson, Jim Moore, Chris Golden and filmmaker Mark Steensland, whose middle grade debut Behind the Bookcase comes out next fall from Delacorte Press. The panel was just one of the many highlights of a fun an inspiring weekend.

This was another:




Every year I play cards at the con and compete for medals that are designed by the con's Artist Guest of Honor. This years' guest was Steven Gilberts, whose work I adore, and I was lucky enough to win the bronze medal that he designed, above. I also bought one of his prints of a painting called Mechanics of Autumn Discourse. You can check out much of Steve's awesome artwork at Steve's websiteHERE.

My Wild Life, Part XIII

It can't be all zombies and ghosts, can it? How about some other strange creatures, like hummingbirds? Two or three of them visit us on the patio at dinner--here's some photos:

Dinner Time

The Approach

Vampire Bird?


Drinking Deep

Bye, Kids!

Other People's Blogs and Giveaway

I did a guest post over at The Bookish Brunette, a blog that--without hyperbole--contains some of the best book blogging I have read of late, especially for YA (the blog in general, not necessarily my post). If you would like a chance to win the signed copy of Passing Strange that we are giving away, or you are curious as to what the title of my first non-GD novel from Disney will be, check out my post at The Bookish Brunette!

R and R

Passing Strange comes out in paperback next week; don't forget to buy copies for all of your closest friends (and a few of your enemies--maybe the gift will soften their hearts).

I've a number of good news items on the horizon that I'll be posting soon. In the meantime, enjoy this horizon. I certainly did.

Wrote it, Can't Read It

But it makes me about seven kinds of happy...



The Turkish edition of Generation Dead, a few copies of which came in the mail today!

Music Recommendation of the Day

One of my favorite musicians, Joe Frawley, has a new CD out. Joe's music is so unique that it defies easy description; both cerebral and emotive, a fascinating mix of fresh composition and found sounds. I haven't yet heard his newest release Carnival, but I have yet to be disappointed with any of his music.

You can check out the new release HERE

May is Margi Month

Many thanks to Kirsten H., who sent in this lovely artwork of Margi, who wraps up a story on mysocalledundeath. I think it really captures her special spark!

Generation Dead Around the World

Received a bunch of these, the Spanish edition of Passing Strange, in the mail the other day, and they look sweet. Weirdly, they are almost twice as thick as Beso De Vida and Generacion Dead even though the page count is nearly the same. Super thick paper, I guess.

A few quick notes:

**I mailed out all of the contest winners' books last week, so hopefully they should have arrived or will arrive in a day or so.

**A few of you asked about the Gen Dead series for Nook, because those editions were not available the same day the Kindle editions were; they are all available now.

**The Unicorn Conference was a great time, and I met and hung out with a number of fun industry professionals and promising writers. Thanks again to Jan and staff for having me and to Christopher Golden for passing my name along.

**I have become obsessed with acquiring an Apple iPad 2, but have been holding out for a specific one. My friend laughs at me when I say that I will never download a game (did I mention I find video games very addictive?) but I insist it is true.

**Once I have said iPad, I will probably begin using my Twitter account, which I've had for quite awhile but never used before. I don't really even know how to tell you where to find me on Twitter; I think my Twitter ID is WatersDan. I've never sent a tweet before but expect to be chirping with the best of them.

GenDead Around the World

I am informed by members of the European and South American branches of the After Party that this will be out on April 7:




If you find yourself in a Spanish speaking country, by all means go to the local bookstore and buy two or three copies, just to be safe.

Unicorns, Writers, and Winners

I will be a guest speaker at the Unicorn Writers' Conference at Saint Clements Castle in Portland, CT this April 9th. A Castle? Unicorns? Writers? All that was missing was a troll for under the drawbridge, which was why they called me.

Actually, they called me at the suggestion of my friend Christopher Golden. Chris is multi-talented, multi-faceted author who has produced great work in a variety of genres and styles and you should check out his website href="http://www.christophergolden.com/index2.html">HERE

True story--the very first book I was given as a recommendation by an encouraging editor when I began to submit YA work was a book Chris wrote with Tom Sniegoski. My book deal materialized about a year later--coincidence, or conspiracy???

If you are interested in the Unicorn Writers' Conference and perhaps in conversing with a troll ("Answer me these riddles three..."), then visit the Conference site HERE

Regarding the big e-book contest, here are the final three winners from last week:

krazykittymatt!

Jennifer D.!

Carole M.!

Thank you all for your work making the After Party such a success!

With luck, I will mail out the books next week. Also, this weekend I will be picking the winner of the grand prize--the entire Generation Dead series, signed, in hardcover! Stay tuned