I love that they’re in the theater (a pivotal location in the story), but more than that, I love their expressions. Alona is smug (of course), and Will looks completely exasperated, which is about right.

What do you guys think?

Honestly, even after all this time, I’m not sure where to begin. I think I have three main areas of complaint, and to be clear, none of this is about the acting or actors involved. These items are purely related to the writing of the show and the choices the writers are making. (And hey, who am I to judge? I’ve never written for television, so I don’t know what it’s like. I’m reacting to this purely as a viewer.)

First, Becky. Here’s the thing. Becky is an easy target. She’s a joke, a caricature instead of a character. They’ve made her that way, and they just keep going back to that same well, making her crazier every time. It’s weak. I’ll be honest, the first time Becky made an appearance, I thought it was clever, fun. A way of letting us know they’re aware how devoted and passionate (and occasionally a little over the top) the fanbase for the show can be. It was like an inside joke. The second time Becky appeared, I liked her a little less because she was edging closer to crazy (stealing Chuck’s phone to text the boys, taking them away from actual life-saving activities) and completely oblivious to Sam’s lack of interest in her. The first time I can attribute her behavior to being starstruck (presumably she admires Sam as well as finds him attractive). The second time, it comes off more as creepy and manipulative.

And now…now, she’s just ridiculous and, on a certain level, insulting. HELLO. She’s a stand-in for us, the devoted viewers. (Well, those of us who remain devoted…I know that number is shrinking. I’m not even sure if I count myself among them anymore.) The writers have gone to great lengths to make sure that connection between Becky and the audience is made, whether it’s referencing her use of the message boards or, in previous eps, attending an SPN con. If you follow that logic, THEY ARE MAKING FUN OF US EVERY TIME SHE APPEARS. And then with the way Becky is treated on the show…well, if you extend that metaphor to the end, they’re saying: we can treat them (Becky) like shit and they are (Becky is) just crazy enough to keep coming back for more. They (she) will take any scrap of attention we give and be grateful for it.

You know what would have impressed me more? If they’d humanized Becky. Made her a real person with strong feelings toward these people she sees as heroes (and okay, as characters, too.) I mean, isn’t it pretty basic logic that if you’re going to make the AUDIENCE a CHARACTER on your show it should be a character that the audience can like or admire or at least not be embarrassed by?

The writers could have done that. They could have given Becky a nice two or three ep arc where she was helping the boys out, to their shock and perhaps dismay. Because here’s the thing, Becky knows her sh*t and she wasn’t afraid to step in and save Sam when he needed it. They could USE more people like that in their lives. More allies (even crazy ones) would be welcome. Now, granted, a scenario like that would put Sam in a difficult position because he knows Becky’s feelings for him are motivating her willingness to risk her life and he also knows he doesn’t feel the same way toward her, but if they really needed her help…man, that’s juicy conflict. Wish it would have played out like that.

(Hence, the title of my blog post. I mean, take away some of the writer-induced crazy, and here you have a girl who knows what the Winchester life is like, admires what they’re doing, could actually help out from time to time with her comprehensive knowledge about their world, and she’s cute. As I said, Sam Winchester should be so damn lucky.)

Second, Sam and Dean’s attitude toward Becky, both individually (such as Dean’s reaction to them getting married) and together (the “whew, dodged that bullet” attitude at the end.) All right. I admit, I might be a little sensitive about this. But occasionally, I get a little tired of shows hauling out a pretty girl and tagging her as lesser because she doesn’t meet some theoretical higher beauty standard held by the genuine love interests (however few and far between they’ve been) that have appeared on the show. I mean, if we’re going to do this Becky = crazy, defy expectations. Make her gorgeous, make her nuts about Supernatural, and make Dean conflicted about wanting to sleep with her but also afraid of increasing her infatuation AKA craziness.

Also, back to the whole audience relatablity thing…so our stand-in is a lonely girl deemed unattractive (not that the actress actually IS unattractive, but we’re apparently supposed to think she is, hence Crowley’s crack about her having good personality) with no social life, no prospects and the only way she/we can get a date to the reunion is by drugging him? Um, thanks? (Also, she had to MARRY him to get him to go the reunion? She couldn’t just drug him for a night or two? Once again, they’re pointing out the levels of her desperation and asking us to laugh. Yuck.)

One could make the argument that the SPN writers are doing in the Becky episodes what The Big Bang Theory folks do every week–making fun of the very people who like their show. But BBT is a show in praise of nerds and geeks. We laugh because we identify WITH their idiosyncrasies. In this case, with Becky, we’re supposed to be laughing AT her. And quite frankly, I’ve had enough of that for one lifetime.

Third, details, details, DETAILS! Willing suspension of disbelief is all in the details. If you’re going to go to all this trouble of establishing the precept that Sam and Dean must hide–they can’t use the Impala, they have to change their phones on a irregular-regular basis (or whatever Deveraux says), they can’t use any of their regular aliases, they can’t run their credit card scams, etc.– then please tell me how a scene in which Sam is signing his REAL NAME on the annulment papers (and presumably the marriage certificate before it) makes sense? As far as I know, a marriage certificate is a public document, as in one filed at the County Clerk’s Office. I assume that the annulment papers would be the same. If the Leviathans have people in the credit bureaus, I’m assuming they’ve got someone running the occasional Google search as well.

Speaking of which, SAM, way to let Becky tweet about what’s going on so the Leviathans can track her and/or you down. Twitter is public and searchable. Sheesh. The love potion, presumably, doesn’t impact his brain function in any other way other than making him think he’s in love, right?

And this is the first time we’ve heard of Vegas Week, right? In other words, something that is supposed to be so part of the canon that Chuck would write about it…and there’s been no mention of it? To be clear, I don’t have a problem with them filling in the gaps. We don’t know everything about Sam and Dean’s lives and certainly stuff has to happen outside the confines of what we see on the show. But if this is an annual trip, and presumably an important enough one for Chuck to have bothered writing about it, then it feels weird and made up that we’re JUST hearing about it now.

All this being said, I really enjoyed last Friday’s “How to Win Friends and Influence Monsters” so I’m not giving up yet. But…grrrr. The inconsistency is very frustrating.

Note: I’m totally up for a discussion on any of this–love hearing from other SPN fans–but hey, if it gets all name-call-y and nasty–as I’ve witnessed on other sites–I will use my delete powers with impunity.

Okay, so without any further ado…

As I said in my email to my editor, this cover is everything it should be! I love it so much. And yes, it made me all teary-eyed when I saw it.

Will and Alona are holding hands!!! Oh! I just love it. And see how the two of them are looking at each other? There’s such affection and fondness and maybe more…

And that beautiful light at the end of the hall…so perfect.

Obviously, I’m just a wee bit emotional about this cover (I LOVE IT!) And I hope you all feel the same!

(Side note: I did find out today that there WILL be a new cover on the paperback for Queen of the Dead, so we will have one more cover announcement for the series in coming months! I’ve seen it already and it is very cool!)

The third book is called BODY & SOUL.

You guys, I had so much fun writing this one!!! I envisioned some of these scenes all the way back when I was writing the first book, and it was amazing to finally get to put them down on paper (so to speak). And I’m super excited for you to read it and see what you think. This is the final book in the trilogy.

It is scheduled for release on May 29, 2012. We don’t have cover art yet.

This is my (horrible) placeholder for the Books page (and yes, it’s okay to laugh at my feeble attempt at art):

Clearly, my future as a sketch artist is doomed.

And here, finally, is the jacket copy…but please, don’t read it if you haven’t yet read QUEEN OF THE DEAD. It contains massive spoilers for that book.

Stop now if you haven’t read QUEEN OF THE DEAD…

in
3…

2…

1…

BODY & SOUL

The Ghost
I’ve been trapped in the body of Lily “Ally” Turner for a month now. Talk about a fashion crisis on an epic scale. What worries me more, though, is sometimes I catch Will looking at me like he thinks I’m Lily…or that he wishes I were. Without the good looks of my former self, I don’t know who I am, or if who that is is good enough. I need out of this mess. Now.

Will and I have been looking for a solution, one that would separate me from Lily without killing her. But it’s not going well. Then, when it seems like things couldn’t get any worse, we run into Misty, my former best friend and boyfriend-stealer extraordinaire, who claims she’s being haunted…by me. Seriously?

I’m determined to get to the bottom of who’s pretending to be the spirit of Alona Dare (while I’m pretending to be someone else) and then get the heck out of this body. Or die trying…

The Goth
I’ll admit it. It’s really weird to look at Alona but see Lily. I do know the difference, though, contrary to what Alona might be saying. And Alona is more than a pretty face to me, not that she would believe that.

Our one lead for some help in this messed up situation might be a page torn from the yellow pages—the “Psychics” section—I found in my dad’s stuff. One of the “fakes” seems a bit more real—and odd—than the others. Before I can investigate further, though, Alona is off and chasing a ghost that’s probably nothing more than a figment of Misty’s guilty imagination. Now Lily’s family is freaking out because she didn’t come home, my mom is ordering me to stay out of it, and something is definitely wrong with the person formerly known as Lily “Ally” Turner…

Every book is different. I don’t know how to explain it, but even within the same series, with the same characters, every book has different sticking points, things I struggle with. And starting a new series with new characters, that’s even trickier, I think.

My mentor and friend, the awesome Linnea Sinclair, once compared it to skiing. You know how to ski. But that doesn’t mean you know *this* mountain. Every story is its own mountain, a challenge to your skills and experience in a new way.

I think this is probably a good thing in the end–keeps us challenged and learning.

But when you’re stuck and wiping out on the mountain–over and over again, cursing it for being different than all the other mountains you’ve skied–it doesn’t feel like it.

So, in an effort to help myself in those future moments when I’m convinced I’m going to be permanently stuck on the side of one of those story mountains, I always try to write down what I’ve learned (or re-learned) during the writing of a draft.

I’m still going to make mistakes. I’m still going to get stuck. But maybe I won’t make the SAME mistakes. And maybe what I’ve learned in the past will help get me out of some future jam.

I usually jot these notes down in my writing notebook, but I’ve been getting more and more emails asking about writing advice, so I thought I’d post it here this time.

(Note: as with anything with writing, these items may work for you, or they may not. There is no one right way to write a book. Also, as you’ll see in a moment, I’m WAY more of a “pantser” than a plotter. Again, you should do whatever works for you.)

1) Write a crappy first draft.
This is not a new lesson for me. Nor is it original to me. I first read about it in Anne Lamott’s brilliant book on writing: Bird by Bird.

She talks about how the need to be perfect right out of the gate can have a paralyzing effect on your writing. Or, I think, on anything. After years of doing this, I can tell you that it is impossible for a mere mortal to get book exactly right on the first attempt. At the very least, there will be spelling mistakes! But more than that, most likely.

Story-telling, I think, is about layering. In the end, the reader responds to the depth of the story, the layers of story, character, description, emotion, etc. But I’m not sure if it’s possible to get all those layers in with one draft. In fact, I think sometimes it’s impossible to know what’s important, what layers need to be added, until after you have a working draft.

So you write a crappy draft. And you have fun with it. You don’t worry about making a mess or how it’s going to turn out. You just write it. Some of it will be salvageable. Some of it won’t be. Some of it will be good writing. Some of it will make you cringe. But the idea is that you couldn’t have gotten to the good writing without allowing yourself the opportunity to be free and make mistakes. My mantra during this part of the process is always, “I can fix it later. Keep going.”

2) Write all the way to the end.
This one I learned on my own, the hard way. But through several conversations with the amazing and prolific Ann Aguirre, I realized I’d stumbled onto something important. (Ann confirmed it, having discovered this idea long before me.)

When you’re writing your crappy first draft, your judgment is…well, impaired is the nicest way to put it. In truth, you will not be able to tell, at times, good from the bad. I’ve found chapters that I HATED writing–ones I could only convince myself to write by telling myself it was just a crappy first draft–ended up being some of my favorites.

Because of this impaired judgment, I would often work on my crappy first draft until I reached a point where I couldn’t stand the sheer crappiness of it any longer and then I would quit and begin revising.

So. Very. Dumb.

Because here’s the thing, yeah, some parts of that draft were pretty awful. But the first draft is the exploratory draft. Often you don’t know where you’re going until the end. If you cut yourself off before the end, then you’re missing out on an important part of the development process. It’s like turning around and going home before you reach your destination. Yep, there’s probably a more efficient route, but you can’t find it if you’re always turning around before you get to the end.

And if you start revising too soon, you might end up changing things that don’t need to be changed.

Usually, the parts that made me cringe ended up not being as bad as I thought (or even pretty good) once I figured out where the book needed to go. And the parts that were bad…I just cut them with the confidence that I was making the book better.

So. Write all the way to THE END. Even if you have to make ridiculous leaps of logic or cringe your way through chapters. Get all the way to the end. It’s important.

3) When stuck, use the “Twenty Things” list.
This one’s pretty simple, and also not original to me. I picked this up somewhere along the way from a writing book or seminar. But I don’t remember where! So, credit is due…to someone, somewhere.

When you’re stuck and you aren’t sure what happens next (or the options you can immediately think of are unappealing), sit down with your writing notebook or a legal pad and write down twenty things that could happen next.

Include the logical but unsatisfying options you’ve been considering, but don’t stop there. Go hog wild. Fill that list with crazy possibilities. Things you’ve not allowed yourself to think about previously. A character needs to get from point A to point B, but you’re not sure how.
–borrow a car
–walk
–get a ride from a friend
–call a cab
–steal a car from the elderly neighbor who never leaves the house anymore
–alien abduction
–etc.

Whatever. You get the idea. The point of the exercise is just to open your mind up to the possibilities. And between the boring options and the crazy ones, you usually find one that’s just right and oh-so-intriguing. Which is what you’re looking for.

4) A daily goal and a kitchen timer can save you.
Writing is hard. No matter how much you love it, there are days when it’s easy to become distracted. Or heck, just days you want to stay in bed and read.

Most writers I know use word goals, a certain number of words per day they feel comfortable with writing and will keep them on target for meeting their deadline.

I used to pride myself on stretching. Writing as many words as I could in a day. Sometimes 3,000 or more. But the trouble with that is, I was outpacing “the boys in the basement” as Stephen King refers to them in his book, On Writing.

Basically, it’s the part of your mind that processes on an unconscious level, the part that is always thinking about the story, the part of you that is connected to whatever inspirational source/well that drives this whole shebang. And if you outpace “the boys,” you don’t have material for the next writing session. Not good.

So, okay, fine, I could set a goal based on my daily word maximum. That would make sense, right? Set a goal of hitting my maximum every day. Yeah, no.

For one thing, some days are better than others. And it is amazingly easy to become discouraged. To fall behind and try to punish ourselves for it. “Well, I was supposed to do 2,000 words yesterday, but I only did 1,500. So, now I have to do 2,500 words today to make up for it.”

UGH. No, thank you. As I said, writing is hard enough. I don’t want to make it worse for myself.

I think I learned this technique in Todd Stone’s Novelist’s Boot Camp seminar a couple of years ago. (As you can see, I’m big on learning more and more about writing!)

It basically works like this: set your daily goal at something you know you can readily accomplish. Something reasonable. And yeah, you can probably do more. Some days, you might write more. Which means, yea! You surpassed your goal. But there will be other days where even this oh-so-reasonable number will laugh at your futile attempts to reach it.

It will end up balancing out.

And you’re not allowed to punish yourself by adding to your next day’s goal on days you miss it. It’s always X. 500 words or whatever.

For the days where distraction reigned supreme and I wanted to spend two minutes writing and four hours reading Twitter, I found a kitchen timer came in handy. I’d set it for fifteen minutes and make myself write–no peeking at email, Twitter or Facebook during that time. When the timer went off, I was then allowed a break to check email, Twitter, etc.

Then I’d set the timer again. Over and over, until I reached my goal. Most of the time, I found the days I really struggled with writing, it was mostly because I was struggling with my confidence in my ability to convey a certain scene or emotion. But the timer and the daily goal take away the option of wimping out.

5) Remember it’s a process.
This is something I have to *keep* learning. Remembering that this crappy first draft won’t always be crappy, but that I have to start somewhere. And once I’ve got a draft down, then it’s a process to begin fixing it up. Just like remodeling a house. You can’t tear out all the walls and work on the roof at the same time. The roof would fall down. So you, fix the walls, THEN the roof. Or whatever. You get the idea. It’s a process. Keep focused. One thing at a time until you’re done.

What about all of you writers out there? Are there tips and techniques you’ve found that help you get through a draft?

This year, one of my favorites is Sharks & Boys by Kristen Tracy:

When 15-year-old Enid Calhoun follows her boyfriend Wick to Maryland for a party, fearful that he might be intending to cheat on her, she finds herself sneaking on board a houseboat where Wick and his friends plan to have a wild night. But before the boys discover their stowaway, a hurricane strikes, and the teenagers are carried miles from the shore and shipwrecked. What follows is a harrowing, yet heartwarming, story of survival, as the teens battle hypothermia, dehydration, man-eating sharks—and along the way, confront their own deepest secrets, including their catalytic roles in the disaster.

(Description from BN.com and image from KristenTracy.com)

I first heard about this book last summer when Kristen and I met on the UnREQUIRED Reading Tour. She described it as “The Breakfast Club with sharks.” And of course, that is one of my all-time favorite movies, so I was like, I HAVE to check this out.

You guys. This book kept me in my seat from page one all the way until the end. I was riveted. Because my friend KT? Not afraid to kill people off. And the descriptions of being out on the open water, all alone, with no water and no food…it was enough to make me nervous about ever going out on the ocean again.

And yet, it’s not this big over-the-top “I SURVIVED” kind of tale–it’s mostly about a girl whose life is falling apart. And she makes one bad decision (well, okay, a series of bad decisions that involve following her possibly cheating boyfriend) and ends up in this life-or-death situation.

And it’s funny. I know that seems counter-intuitive but that’s one of things that makes this book so fresh and enjoyable. It’s not like anything I’ve read before.

For example, Enid’s mom makes wedding cakes, and Enid helps by creating the marzipan (it’s edible almond paste that you can mold into shapes) cake figures of the bride and groom. And Enid takes great care to get them just right, to make them as close to perfect as possible.

So, when she loses it a little while delivering the cake to a wedding–she’s freaking out because her boyfriend may have truly broken up with her and then she’ll be left with dating someone like Gary, the weird awkward groomsman–the marzipan figures suffer:

“I bite the shoes off the groom. It only takes one snap of my jaw, and I’ve got a wad of almond paste in my mouth. I chew it like I’ve been poisoned and marzipan tuxedo shoes are the only antidote. At his pant cuffs, I can see my smooth teeth marks.

Then I lift the bride to my mouth. I’m careful to take just her shoes and leave her delicate ankles intact. As I chew the marzipan, I try to swallow it fast. I want to digest it. I want it to become a part of me. I look at the de-footed bride. If you focus on her head, she doesn’t really seem that different. But if you zero in on her ankles, she looks like she’s been in some kind of unfortunate accident with a butter knife. I run my tongue along my teeth and smile. Take that, I think to unnamed hordes of people out there who think I’m boring. I just did something crazy. I just did something stupid for no good reason at all. And I’m not finished either.”

Awesome.

So, in celebration, I’m giving away TWO signed copies of Sharks & Boys! (We may also have a signed deck of Hyperion playing cards to give away as well. I’m seeing Kristen tomorrow–yea!–and I’ll see what else I can get her to sign.)

There are two ways to enter:

1) Leave a comment below with your worst fear/phobia. (For example, mine would be birds. *shudder* Don’t ask.) Make sure to include your email with your comment so I can contact you!

2) Tweet about your worst fear/phobia and use the hashtag #sharksandboys. (Be sure to use the word “and” in the hashtag and not “&” because punctuation always freaks out the hashtag system on Twitter, don’t know why.)

We’ll draw two winners next Friday, July 15. The contest is open internationally.

And to celebrate, we’re having a little party at the Barnes and Noble in Hawthorn Mall. Everyone is invited!

There will be cake, some fun swag, and prizes!

Details
Date: Tuesday, 5/31
Time: 7pm
Location: Barnes and Noble, Vernon Hills, Illinois
(It’s in the mall).

Hope to see you there!

So, on this particular Monday afternoon, I was out walking my dogs and SPEAK NOW came up in rotation (just after Carrie Underwood’s COWBOY CASANOVA, actually….and while we’re at it, Katy Perry’s E.T. is in heavy rotation at my house right now) and I thought to myself, “She is so cool, and I love how she tells a story in the song.”

That’s not the first time I’ve thought that, of course, but it is the first time I’ve thought that and then returned to the house to find out this bit of news:

At various Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, and Carrie Underwood concerts this summer (Eeeeeee!), Alloy Teen Media will be handing out these most awesome light-up key chains with Queen of the Dead on one side and the most fabulous Ally Carter’s Uncommon Criminals on the other!

The keychains also list links for individual pages for Queen of the Dead and Uncommon Criminals, where you can read the first chapter or so.

Here’s a list of the concert dates where you can get the keychains:
PHILIPS ARENA
TAYLOR SWIFT
ATLANTA
GA
9-Jul

PRUDENTIAL CENTER
TAYLOR SWIFT
NEWARK
NJ
19-Jul

VERIZON CENTER
TAYLOR SWIFT
WASHINGTON
DC
2-Aug

NOKIA THEATER
KATY PERRY
LOS ANGELES
CA
5-Aug

LINCOLN FINANCIAL FIELD
TAYLOR SWIFT
PHILADELPHIA
PA
6-Aug

STAPLES CENTER
TAYLOR SWIFT
LOS ANGELES
CA
23-Aug

POWER BALANCE ARENA
TAYLOR SWIFT
SACRAMENTO
CA
3-Sep

RAVINIA PAVILLION
CARRIE UNDERWOOD
HIGHLAND PARK
IL
4-Sep

ROSE GARDEN
TAYLOR SWIFT
PORTLAND
OR
6-Sep

BRIDGESTONE ARENA
TAYLOR SWIFT
NASHVILLE
TN
16-Sep

BRIDGESTONE ARENA
TAYLOR SWIFT
NASHVILLE
TN
17-Sep

When you guys go to these concerts and get your keychains, send me pictures! This is just so cool. I’m super excited be included as part of the promotion!

For those of you who don’t have tickets to these concerts (like me!), it sounds like we’ll be getting some keychains here to give away this summer as well.

HUGE thanks to Hyperion and specifically Ann Dye and her team for setting all of this up. You guys are AMAZING!!! Thank you!

SCHEDULE:
Sunday, 4/3: Arriving in Los Angeles

Monday, 4/4: Signing stock at the B&N in the Grove, Los Angeles. Not sure what time yet, but if you stop by sometime after Monday, there will be signed copies.

Tuesday, 4/5: Big Bang Theory Day! This is when Linnea and are I rolling the dice, showing up at Warner Brothers to wait in line and hoping we get in to see the show filming!

Wednesday, 4/6: RT Convention Westin Bonaventure Hotel
4:45-5:45 p.m. THE NEVER-ENDING STORY: YA SERIES & SEQUELS
Successful series dominate the YA market, but selling and writing a series comes with a unique set of challenges. Join four bestselling series writers as they talk about the appeal of series to a teen audience — and how to keep readers coming back, book after book, without losing your sanity somewhere along the way.

Moderator: Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Panelists: Melissa de la Cruz, Stacey Kade, Carrie Ryan, Rachel Vincent

Thursday, 4/7: RT Convention Westin Bonaventure Hotel
2:45-3:45 pm BOYS DON’T CRY (OR DO THEY?): THE MALE P.O.V.
Writing in first-person (or tight third) is a popular choice for novels today. But what do you do when your main character is a guy and you’re not? Bestselling authors discuss the challenges and advantages of writing in the male point of view and how to maintain authenticity. Find out what it takes to make your male character’s voice ring true in the up-close and personal world of “I” and “me.” Handouts with tips and tricks will be included!

Panelists: Stacey Kade, Karen Miller (AKA K.E. Mills), Linnea Sinclair

Friday, 4/8: RT Convention Westin Bonaventure Hotel
2:45-3:45pm SURVIVING EDITS AND REVISIONS (WITH ONLY A FEW TEARS)
You got the contract, you finished the book and now … revisions. The first day you receive that edit letter, you might feel as though completing these edits is an impossible task. It would be easier to write a new book than to try to fix what you’ve already got! But you can do it. Join Bantam author Linnea Sinclair and Disney-Hyperion author Stacey Kade (who are also critique partners!) to watch real edits in action, learn how to break down revisions into more manageable tasks, find out when to ask for help or more information and when (and how) to speak up when you disagree — all while building a positive relationship with your agent or editor.

Panelists: Stacey Kade, Linnea Sinclair

4-6pm Stacey Kade SIGNING @ Expo (Westin Bonaventure Hotel)

Saturday, 4/9: HOUSTON! TeenBookCon
10:00am-4:00pm Alief Taylor High School
Admission is FREE!
So many awesome authors will be attending and speaking. Come listen to the panels and get your books signed!
Panel schedule for the day

As is proper, we had to wait until everything was official before I could make any sort of announcement. But I’m pleased to say today everything is finally official and I can share this with you:

Publishers Marketplace Announcement

Translation rights: Taryn Fagerness at the Taryn Fagerness Agency.

For those who may not be familiar with Publishers Marketplace announcements, here’s what it means:

1) A new series! Two books, at least. The first one will most likely be released in 2013. YEA!

2) I’ll be working with my AWESOME editor, Christian Trimmer, again as well as all the other wonderful people at Hyperion! DOUBLE YEA!!!

I’m super excited about this new story and the people in it. As usual, I’ll be staying quiet on the details until I’m a little farther along in the process, but I’ll share more of a description as soon as I can.

A huge thank you to my editor and my publisher for believing in me with a new series and to all of you for reading the G&G series. You made this possible! THANK YOU!