An update, a eulogy, and some announcements
Announcements First!
I have two announcements today, though many more are coming up:
1) I am appearing tonight at THE KING'S ENGLISH, a wonderful bookstore in Salt Lake City, for the launch of my friend Eric Patten's new Middle Grade horror series THE HUNTER CHRONICLES. The first book, which I have read and loved, is called RETURN TO EXILE, and tonight you can be one of the very first to get a copy of your own–and signed, no less! I'll be emceeing and signing my books as well, if anyone's looking for them; the bookstore has all three John Cleaver books, including I DON'T WANT TO KILL YOU, which I know a lot of you have had trouble finding. Not only can you find it tonight, but I will personally scribble in it with a marker.
BONUS ANNOUNCEMENT: I am currently, as I type this, doing a final copyedit of my post-apocalypse YA novel PARTIALS. This is resulting in a lot of leftover manuscript pages that I don't need. Everyone who comes to the signing tonight and buys a copy of RETURN TO EXILE will receive a free, random page of PARTIALS, nearly six months early. Want a bigger piece of the story? Bring your friends and buy more books!
2) I will be appearing again, this weekend, at EPIC PUZZLES AND GAMES in West Valley. The store is running a really cool game day where you can just show up and play games and hang out, all in the name of charity–everyone who brings a can of food to the game store will receive a raffle ticket (one per can), for a drawing that includes a ton of games and prizes and one of my very reassuring T-shirts. I'll be there all day playing board games, so come by, say hi, and sit down for a game with me! There's a poll on the left side of this very webiste where you can tell me exactly which games you want to play. As always, I'll have books for sale as well.
An Update
I have returned from DragonCon! It was, as it always is, awesome. I really want to take my kids next year, the two oldest, though I would keep them far, far away from the Marriot lobby anytime after 7pm. The later it gets, the more costumes appear that rely less on "material" and more on "a personal trainer and a healthy self-image." Some of the highlights:
1) Meeting a bookseller who went nuts upon recognizing my name. Let me tell you, there is pretty much nothing better than that.
2) I hung out a bit with Lou Anders (or should I say "Hugo Award-Winning Lou Anders, since that's how he's taken to introducing himself). He recorded two episodes of Writing Excuses with us, which you guys are going to love, and then he mentioned that he'd watched my youtube presentation on Story Structure and loved it. This is one of the editors I most respect in the industry and he loved something I did; I was incredibly flattered. Then he asked if he could borrow some of it to use in a presentation of his own, and I just about lost it. Huzzah!
3) I finally got a chance to meet Mur Lafferty, who turned out to be one of the legitimately nicest people I've ever met in my life. I can't wait to hang out with her again at World Fantasy.
4) While walking through the giant signing room full of movie stars, my eyes fell on Michael Hogan, famous for his role as Colonel Saul Tigh in the new Battlestar Galactica. Tigh was hands-down my favorite character on that show, and my first thought on seeing him was "wow, he's gotten even older and more grizzled. My second thought, half a microsecond later, was "HOLY CRAP HE'D BE SUCH A PERFECT MR. CROWLEY." I have essentially no say in the casting of my movie, but wow that would be awesome.
A Eulogy
As I mentioned/whined about several times on Twitter and Facebook, my hat was stolen. If you've ever seen me in person, you know the one: a brown, wide-brim fedora, Indiana Jones-style, that I bought on my honeymoon and wore almost every day for 12 years. I'd even personalized it, with a little chain mail bauble a fan made for me at a signing in Seattle. That was actually my second fedora–the first I obtained four years earlier, and lost on a train through the copper canyons of Mexico. If you're going to lose a fedora, a train in Mexico is an awesome way to do it; having it yoinked by some jackhole at Jalapeño Charlie's is a pretty much the opposite end of the scale. I wandered listlessly for a couple of days, broken-hearted, and finally bought a new one (almost exactly the same style) in the dealer's room. Some day, though, when I'm rich and famous (please note that despite what you may think, I am currently neither), I'm going to spring for the full $650 and have one handmade from beaver fur by AdventureBilt, the same company that did the hats from KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL. Say what you will about the movie, it had some pretty rocking' hats.
