Rose-Owls and Pumpkin Girls

Wow. Here we are again.

As of today, we are fifty days from the release of Pocket Apocalypse, the fourth book in the InCryptid series, and the second book narrated by Verity's older brother, Alexander Price. This is it for him, at least for right now; this is where he takes a bow and wanders off into the wings to do something else for a while. Verity will be taking over again for book five before she hands the baton off to their little sister, Antimony, to narrate books six and seven. And just the fact that I can type that sentence with a straight face proves that I am the luckiest girl in the world.

So where are we right now? Well, I'm gearing up for some more giveaways, some of which will be totally effort-free (RNG 4 LYFE), some of which will require a little more work (fan artists, start your engines). I'm editing book five, and prepping for book six, which is the first in my new two-book contract. Thanks to everyone who bought Half-Off Ragnarok and made it possible for me to write Antimony's books. Please keep reading, so I can keep going. I want to make it all the way to the end of this series.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to do as a pre-release countdown this time (or whether I'm going to do one at all). Suggestions are totally welcome! And of course, we'll have another new short story going up on the website around the time the book comes out, featuring another Johnny and Fran adventure. We're coming to the end of their time as the focus of our historical narratives. I'm excited to be moving on Alice and Thomas, one of my all time OTPs, but I'm going to miss Johnny and Fran.

Thank you all, so much. Thank you for allowing me to tell these stories. Thank you for being here. And thank you for buying my books. This was a series that had a very narrow market when it started, and you bought enough copies to make DAW see that it had an audience, and that I should get to continue. Soon, we'll break through the candy shell and expose the true darkness of what people keep assuming is my fluffiest universe. Soon.

I can't wait.

...a copy of Chicks Dig Gaming!

Welcome to the seventh of the Twelve Days of Hogswatch. I will be starting a new giveaway every day between now and December 25th (some other winter holiday). Each giveaway will have different rules, and a different deadline, although all prizes will be mailed on December 29th, because I am bad at going to the post office (and also, still mailing shirts).

The seventh giveaway is for a copy of Chicks Dig Gaming. This is going to be a random number drawing, because that's working well so far.

1. To enter, comment on this post.
2. If you are international, indicate that you are willing/able to pay postage.
3. That's it.

I will choose the winner at 1PM PST on Monday, December 22nd.

Game on!

Fifty days. That's how long we have before The Winter Long will be on bookstore shelves (US on-sale date is September 2nd). Book eight. We made it to book eight. I remember when I was just caught in a loop, rewriting books one through four over and over again, making grandiose plans for book five, but never quite managing to break free and do anything new. Now I'm getting ready to start on book ten, and the path is very clear ahead of me.

Fifty days and five years: that's the distance between Rosemary and Rue and The Winter Long. At an average of 350 pages a book (average; please don't comment to say "but this one was only 338..."), that's almost 3,000 pages of Toby, with more to come. Honestly, I'm amazed she's lived this long, given everything that I've put her through. She's too stubborn to die and too fun to kill, which is probably the only thing that's saved her.

Fifty days and you get to find out everything I haven't been saying since book one. This is the volume where a lot of chickens come home to roost: it's always been planned as the game-changer for act one of the series. I think I managed to accomplish that. Early review copies are out in the world, and thus far there have been no spoilers, for which I am very grateful. I really like it when people can discover what I've done for themselves.

Fifty days. I'll be somewhere in Europe when this book drops (probably in Edinburgh, with Amal, hiding under whatever piece of furniture I can wedge myself beneath), twitchy and waiting for the reviews to come in, yet terrified of reading them. I wish I could be here to do my normal release day funtimes. I'm glad I'll be far away. Somehow, both emotions are succeeding in existing at the same time.

Fifty days. That's so long.

Fifty days. That isn't long at all.

...I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'd promise never to do it again, but let's face it, you're going to be hearing this joke a lot over the next several months, frequently from me. So, uh, look, a punny bunny! Anyway:

As of today, we are fifty days from the release of Half-Off Ragnarok, the third book in the InCryptid series, and the first book narrated by Verity's older brother, Alexander Price. It's a little weird for me, since—like Verity before him—Alex gets to narrate two books on his first outing, and I've already finished the second. For me, he's an established protagonist with two complete adventures under his belt, and for you, he's the new kid on the block, taking over from someone many of you have already learned to love. So that's weird. And I'm still a little stunned that I get to write these books in the first place. Like, I can't even articulate how amazing this has been for me.

So where are we right now? Well, I'm gearing up for some more giveaways, some of which will be totally effort-free (RNG 4 LYFE), some of which will require a little more work (fan artists, start your engines). I'm editing book four, and prepping for book five, which is the last on my current contract (subtext: please, please, if you can, if you enjoy this series, buy it, so I can keep going). I'm getting ready for book launch, and looking in awe at the upcoming UK release of book one, and yeah. It's all amazing.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to do as a pre-release countdown this time (or whether I'm going to do one at all). Suggestions are totally welcome! And of course, we'll have another new short story going up on the website around the time the book comes out, featuring another Johnny and Fran adventure. We're coming to the end of their time as the focus of our historical narratives. I'm excited to be moving on Alice and Thomas, one of my all time OTPs, but I'm going to miss Johnny and Fran.

Thank you all, so much. Thank you for allowing me to tell these stories. Thank you for being here. And thank you for buying my books. This was a series that had a very narrow market when it started, and you bought enough copies to make DAW see that it had an audience, and that I should get to continue. Soon, we'll break through the candy shell and expose the true darkness of what people keep assuming is my fluffiest universe. Soon.

I can't wait.

As of today, we are fifty days from the release of Midnight Blue-Light Special, the second book in the InCryptid series. I am...honestly, I am sort of in shock over here, still. This is one of those series that I desperately wanted to write, and never thought I'd be allowed to. Multi-generational family epic with talking mice and telepathic mathematicians? Seriously? But DAW believed in me, or maybe wanted to see if I'd actually produce the book I was talking about, and somehow that turned into a five book contract and a lot of time spent with the Price family.

I am so blessed, I can't even begin to express it. The fact that I can tell these stories at all is an honor. The part where I get paid for it is like...what? Are you sure? Really? But I do, and it's amazing.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to do as a pre-release countdown this time. I did the alphabet for Discount Armageddon, but that really only works once. Suggestions are totally welcome! And of course, we'll have another new short story going up on the website around the time the book comes out, featuring another Johnny and Fran adventure. Lots of things brewing here in Chez McGuire.

Thank you all, so much. Thank you for allowing me to tell these stories. Thank you for being here. And thank you for buying my books. This was a series that had a very narrow market when it started, and you bought enough copies to make DAW see that it had an audience, and that I should get to continue. Soon, we'll break through the candy shell and expose the true darkness of what people keep assuming is my fluffiest universe. Soon.

I can't wait.

Since I have a book coming out in fifteen days, I figure it's time to once again offer to answer your questions about the world. So...

I will make five blog posts detailing aspects of Toby's universe. Ask me anything! I will not answer every question, but will select the five that I think are the most interesting/fun/relevant, and will detail them to my heart's content. There's a lot to learn and know, and asking loses you nothing.

Leave your questions on this post. I'm declaring comment-reply amnesty for any that I choose not to answer this time, since otherwise, my wee head may explode.

Game on!

ETA: Things covered last two times we did this: inheritance, fosterage, madness, historical records, Cait Sidhe court structure, the Changeling's Choice, locational biology, where fae races come from, shapeshifters, and merlins.

Inchworm, inchworm, measuring the marigolds. You and your arithmetic will probably go far. Or something like that. I am surviving! I am surviving this wet, cold, mucky, awful, no good at all weather week, and I'm doing it with cheer and elan, because I am on the New York Times Bestseller list. Nope. Not tired of saying that. Not gonna be, either.

Here is the current shape of my 2012, with travel dates and everything. Beautiful travel dates. Hope to see you sometime in the months to come.

2012

Publications:
Discount Armageddon, March 2012.
"We Will Not Be Undersold!", March 2012.
"No Place Like Home," April 2012.
Blackout (as Mira Grant), June 2012.
Ashes of Honor, September 2012.

"Rat-Catcher," middle 2012.
"Laughter at the Academy: A Study in the Development of Schizotypal Creative Genius Personality Disorder (SCGPD)," late 2012.

Conventions/Appearances:
Consonance, March 2-4, Newark CA.
Borderlands, March 17, San Francisco CA.
AggieCon, March 23-25, College Station TX.
Emerald City Comic Con, March 30-April 1, Seattle WA.
San Diego International Comic Convention, July 11-14, San Diego CA.
Confluence, July 27-29, Pittsburgh PA.
Chicon (WorldCon 2012), August 30-September 3, Chicago IL.
World Fantasy Convention, November 1-4, Toronto.
Windycon, November 8-11, Chicago IL.

No fixed deadline/being written/unsold:

"Fiber"
"Daughter of the Midway, the Mermaid, and the Open, Lonely Sea"
"These Antique Fables"
"Pixie Season"
Sparrow Hill Road
"Velveteen vs. The Uncomfortable Conversation."
"Velveteen vs. The Fright Night Sorority House Massacre Sleepover Camp, Part III."
"No Place Like Home"
"Stingers and Strangers"
"Loch and Key"
"In Sea Salt Tears"
The Chimes at Midnight
"San Diego 2014"
"We Are All Misfit Toys in the Aftermath of the Velveteen War"
Parasitology
Echo
"How Green This Land, How Blue This Sea"

One month from today (give or take a few days, given shipping times and shelving patterns), Discount Armageddon will be officially released into the wild. People will be able to buy it, not just pre-order it. Reviews will hopefully become more common, without becoming dramatically meaner. My teetering pile of ARCs will be replaced by a teetering pile of author copies. The beat, as they say, will go on.

This is the first new series I've launched under my own name since 2009, when Rosemary and Rue came out. Feed was released in 2010, and I was a nervous wreck about it, but at the end of the day, Mira Grant was another person; if she failed, I would cry a lot, because Feed was a book I really, really loved, but it wouldn't crush me. But this...

I've had some people email me to sadly ask whether I'm tired of Toby. I'm not, and the sixth book comes out this fall (Ashes of Honor). She's just emotionally exhausting, and it's hard for new readers to get into the series without feeling daunted. Whereas InCryptid is something I've really wanted to write for a long time, with characters and situations that I really love, and it's a series and world I've put together with more experience under my belt, allowing me to avoid some of the flaws in Toby's world. Yes, flaws: Toby's world, for all that I adore it, is innately Eurocentric, and can be confusing sometimes, even though the only type of supernatural creatures to exist are the fae. There's a lot of history, and I sort of assumed everyone understood feudalism. It's my world, I made it, and I love it, but there's something amazing about starting from scratch.

A month before Rosemary and Rue came out, I was vomiting with terror. I'm calmer this time, although I'm still anxious as all hell. Will people like my baby? Will it do okay? Will the other new releases beat it up and call it names? Will sales be strong enough that I'm allowed to continue past the second book? It would make a tidy duology, but you've met me: two is never enough. I want to go much, much further in this world, and whether I get to do that will depend partially on book one. I am a bundle of anxiety and neurosis.

But it's almost here. No matter what else happens, no matter what comes next, Discount Armageddon is almost here.

That's pretty much amazing.

Twenty-five days. That's how long we have between here and One Salt Sea. A dollar for each of those days would buy me a bucket of chicken from KFC, or two new paperbacks (with tax), or two tickets to a matinee, if someone else bought the popcorn. An hour for each of those days would give me time to take a nice long nap.

Twenty-five days.

I'm still amazed that this book is something real, that it's about to be something people can buy and have for their very own. I'm still sort of going "but but but the first one just came out, how can we already be on book five?" I'm writing book six. I'm dreaming book eight. And I'm scared as hell of the fact that book five is about to be on shelves.

I think milestones are always big and hard and scary. But this one is just weird. I am amazed and aghast and a little bit afraid of what comes next.

For Late Eclipses, I provided lists of facts and answered questions to ease people toward for release. What should I do this time? Suggestions welcome.

ETA: Guys, I can't, and won't, do drabbles. Not only are they very brain-intensive (and wouldn't you rather have book six?), but the effort of keeping them from being full of spoilers would explode my head. I've tried to indicate nicely that this isn't an option, and now I'm just saying it.

We are now seventy-five days from the release of One Salt Sea. Two and a half months, basically, before the fifth Toby book hits shelves and people can buy it and it's just out there. In the world. Where people will read it, and talk about it, and do all the things that people do with books, whether they like them or not.

This never gets any less frightening. In fact, right now, it comes with an extra bonus dose of frightening, because this is the last Toby book for a year—my March 2012 release with DAW is going to be the first book in the InCryptid series, Discount Armageddon. So this book has to be amazing enough to keep people from forgetting about me.

It's scary and exhilarating and a little "wait, what?" Because this was always the book I couldn't finish. Book five is where I ran out of steam, because these books were never going to come out, and five finished books was just too much for my heart to take. And now it's about to be on shelves. In seventy-five days.

Remember that I have an ARC giveaway going now, which you can enter through tomorrow afternoon. I'll open my second giveaway next week; it's going to involve photography, since we need to have something slightly less wash-and-wear.

Seventy-five days to high tide.

Wow.