So, even though there is absolutely no time for being sick, I'm sick. Hard to tell yet just how sick, but sick enough. It started off yesterday morning as a scratchy throat. Thing is, Spooky's been sick for almost a week, and every time I'd ask her about it, she'd tell me it was just allergies caused by the dust we're stirring up packing. To me, she looked sick, not allergic, but hey, she ought to know. So I didn't worry about catching it. But now I'm sick. Last night, fevers and chills. We have to hope this fucker is short lived, because here it is May 6th, and we leave Atlanta on Thursday, May 29th for Providence. And there is all the packing, and a mountain of work, and deadlines and scheduling that simply can not be Put Off Until Later. I used up all my sick time, back in February. And, possibly the worst problem here is that colds and flu often (since the mid '80s) leave me with a severe cough that can last, literally, for months. After I had the flu in February, I coughed an additional six weeks. And the bad tooth cannot be pulled if I'm coughing, because then it won't heal properly. So. Yeah. It's sort of a disaster.

Yesterday. We spent eight hours (1-9 pm) working on the corrections to A is for Alien, and we're still not done. So, that will be today. We also need to take books back to the Emory University library, but that may have to wait until tomorrow. Today, I get more misplaced or missing commas, fact checking, clumsy word repetitions, and other assorted tedium. Oh, and a good example of why sf writers should worry only just so much about the science in their sf stories. When I wrote "Zero Summer" in the summer of 2005, Saturn was believed to have 43 moons, but now, revising the story in 2007, I know that Saturn has more than 60 confirmed natural satellites. But the story is set in the nearish future. By then, we may know that Saturn has 80 moons. Do I stick with 60, knowing that astronomers consider that number provisional? Do I "guesstimate" ahead? Do I revise the story again in a few years? Frankly, the facts are hardly relevant to the truths of the story, so screw it.

My thanks to robyn_ma for pointing out that I can now actually see Isabella Rossellini's "bug porn" (Green Porno) at the Sundance Channel website. Yesterday, the site wasn't letting me in; today it is. Oh, and yes, I have downloaded the new, free NIN, and I'm listening to it now.

At some point yesterday, I left Spooky alone to work on the corrections to A is for Alien. I lay down on the sofa, thinking I could at least read the next chapter of Chris Beard's book on primate origins, but, instead, the best I could manage was an hour of being half asleep, dreaming though I was partly still awake. Later, late last night, Spooky read me more from House of Leaves, the terrible scene on the staircase, Navidson trapped alone at the bottom when it suddenly grows to impossible proportions, Tex's story of the sinking of the Atrocity. Not the perfect thing before bed, so then she read me Robert McCloskey's Time of Wonder (1957), which won a Caldecott Medal and is one of my all time favourite children's books. "Where do hummingbirds go in a hurricane?" Beautiful.

I got the following from Alan S. Montroso, via email, "...As was your story "Concerning Attrition and Severance"; its imagery and majesty have haunted me through the weekend. I understand why you felt it belonged in the obscurity of a closed drawer, but I am also grateful such a cruel creature has been unleashed." Thank you, Alan. It's good to see these reactions, because the story's out there now, and there's no pulling it back in. Comments on Sirenia Digest #29 are still welcome, by the way.

I haven't given the list of books in print in a while, so here it is again. And, though it might be cheaper and the "green" thing to do, buying used copies of my novels from Amazon, sadly, in no way helps my sales figures. Sadder still, I have to actually think about shit like sales figures:

Daughter of Hounds

Silk

Threshold

Low Red Moon

Murder of Angels

Tales of Pain and Wonder

And here's the Amazon wish list, because, after all, this has been declared my Royal Birthday Month and -04 is a mere 20 days away.

There's a lot more of substance I wanted to write about this morning, but I feel like unto butt, and somehow I have to make it through the remainder of the corrections to A is for Alien.

Sunday morning. I know it's Sunday morning because the Xtians one block over are wailing like the rapture came yesterday and none of them were taken. I have music (PJ Harvey) playing on the iMac as loud as is reasonable, trying to block out the PentecostalBaptistwhatever whooping and caterwauling. I am fairly certain there are no churches so near the new place in Providence, and if there are, they almost certainly won't be of the yodeling variety. Some nice, quiet Catholics, please, or Episcopalians or something of that ilk. Maybe a synagogue or mosque.

Asleep about 3 ayem last night, but then awake at a little before 9 ayem, after a long and unnerving series of dreams. Mild dreamsickness now, almost three hours since I awoke. I don't recall much of the bloody thing (thank you, Ambien). Even less I'm willing to put down here. But there was some bit where I was sitting on the kitchen floor with a carving knife, and all the lights were out. All the lights, as though from a power outage. It was so dark, and I sat there with the knife, gouging at the wall, listening to something moving about outside, just beneath the kitchen window, rustling through the holly bush. And another fragment, still with the knife, but I was sitting in a very brightly lit room at a sink, scrubbing at the blade. It was clean, but I kept scrubbing at it. The water from the tap was icy cold. I had nothing to scrub at the knife with but water and my bare fingers, and always there was the sensation of being watched.

---

Yesterday, I wrote 1,030 words on a new story/vignette for Sirenia Digest #30 (May; the issue after #29, the forthcoming April issue). For several years now, I've been trying to find a story to accompany the title "Rappaccini's Dragon." Sitting here yesterday, paging through Laurence Gadd's Deadly Beautiful, the story found me. It's a fairy tale, sort of, about revenge, and toxicity, and the limits of the human body as a weapon.

A rather nice little review of Threshold at Rambles.net. I figured I'd mention it, since I made such a fuss about that silly Amazon.com "review" of Low Red Moon a few days back. The comment, "It's hard to believe Threshold is only Kiernan's second book," made me smile, because, in truth it was my fourth novel. The first was The Five of Cups (though it wasn't published until 2003) and then there was the ghostwritten novel I did after finishing and selling Silk (and no, I can't tell, so don't ask). I do wish reviewers would resist this urge to summarize, and remember that book reviews are not book reports. But yes, a nice review.

Otherwise, not much to yesterday. I didn't leave the house. I packed exactly one box (books). Spooky went out and got BBQ from Dusty's for dinner (truly, I will miss Dusty's). There were splendid thunderstorms all night, it seemed. In Second Life, Spooky and I worked a bit on the new wing of the Palaeozoic Museum in New Babbage, then attended a Very Special Event in Toxia. And that was yesterday.

Ever seen a platypus brew a cup of coffee? Someday, I shall have to take photos.

I have tried, the last year or so, to ignore "reviews" on Amazon.com, as well as those posted to blogs and suchlike. I am aware that in the eyes of some, it appears unseemly when an author replies to her critics (and I'm being rather generous here with the word "critic"). However, myself, I have always felt that it is only reasonable that the author be permitted an equal opportunity to reply, especially when the criticism in question is demonstrably wrong or wrong-headed and may, in theory, adversely affect book sales. Anyway. Yes. I have been good. But this morning I saw a "review" of Low Red Moon on Amazon.com, posted maybe a month back, and it annoyed me, and then I had a hard day, and so I am allowing myself to fall off the wagon (for one day only). The "review," posted by Kathryn Daugherty ("tropo9"), reads as follows:

In this sequel to Threshold, Deacon and Chance are married and Chance is pregnant. Sadie is Deacon's friend, but neither remember their affair after Chance left Deacon. Even Chance doesn't remember turning back time in the water tunnel to save Elisa, but instead is again freaked out by her psychic premonitions of raining blood.

This story is really about Narcissa Snow, a part goblin child raised by an insane father on the coast of Rhode Island. She is convinced that if she gives the goblins a changeling child, then she will finally be accepted into the goblin community. The child she wishes to give them is Chance's. She travels to Birmingham, committing mutilations and murders along the way. Deacon is caught up in her schemes when Narcissa kills one of Deacon's old friends and the police ask Deacon for his psychic assistance.

The best part of the novel is that the author has cleaned up her language. The narrative is strong and sure. The worst part of the novel is that not for one second can you believe that Deacon loves Chance or that Chance loves Deacon. Why did they get married? Why is Deacon sober? Chance seems to hate Deacon and is always convinced that he is about to fall off the wagon. Deacon feels weak and useless. If you have no sympathy for the main characters and no understanding of their situation, then the author has done a very poor job. It is rather depressing that such a good writer has no understanding of human motivations.

Now...to start with, I must assume that Miss Daugherty means "ghoul" when she says "goblin," as the word "goblin" appears only twice in the novel, and only once, jokingly, as a reference to the ghouls. Secondly, who the hell of "Elisa"? I will assume, from context, that she means Elise. Third, Narcissa was raised in the North Shore region of Massachusetts, north of Cape Ann, not "on the coast of Rhode Island." Okay. So that three factual errors in the first paragraph, when, I assume, Miss Daugherty must have written this review fairly soon after having read the novel. Do I question reading comprehension here or retention of what has been read?

Regardless, what really stuns me is that final paragraph, where we are told that "not for one second can you believe that Deacon loves Chance or that Chance loves Deacon," and her calling into question the possibility that they would have married. This is so idiotic that I'm not even going into all the instances by which I could prove that, while Chance and Deacon are hardly one of those mythic ideal couples you see beaming from Match.com commercials, there is ample evidence in this book that they do love each other quite a lot. And never mind the fact that the "reviewer" seems to be labouring under the assumption that all marriages are successful, or that all married people love each other, or that all married people appear to love each other, and so forth. She's joking, right? Please note, I am not objecting to the fact that she didn't like the book, but to the fact that she cannot be bothered to write an informed review. And as for the line, "The best part of the novel is that the author has cleaned up her language," well, I'm not even going to presume to know what she means by that.

Idiot. Anyway, yeah, you can read (and rate) the "review" here.

Yes, I am disappointed by the results of the Pennsylvania primary. I don't think that either Clinton or Obama have much of a chance of winning the presidency, and I'm not one of those who sees Obama as some sort of panacea for the ills of this country, but, still. I've been trying to hope.

Yesterday, I wrote 1,125 words on a new piece for Sirenia Digest #30. It has no title, and I'm really not sure, yet, how to describe it.

While I'm thinking of it, here's that list again, those of my books in print, the ones that need to sell, the editions that need to sell (new, not used copies), etc.:

Daughter of Hounds

Silk

Threshold

Low Red Moon

Murder of Angels

Tales of Pain and Wonder

Not much else to say for yesterday. I read a bit of Justine by the Marquis DeSade before I started writing. Last night, I watched two episodes of Deadliest Catch (despite the Bon Jovi theme song), a series I have a peculiar fondness for. My thing about the sea, I suppose. Hauling things up from the sea. The bleak beauty of the Bering Strait.

I think I need intravenous Red Bull this morning... (and it's not even really morning now, as of seventeen minutes ago).

I'm predicting a short journal entry. Let's see if I know of what I speak...

Yesterday, I began and finished the second section of Chapter One of The Red Tree. A total of 1,346 words, so a very good writing day. At least, as regards the number of words written. Already, I am struggling with doubts. Somehow, the text does not seem as solid, as dense, as detailed, as authentic as it needs to feel. This may all be in my mind, I do not know. I see now that this chapter will likely have four sections. I'll begin the third this afternoon.

And yesterday I had two readers tell me that they find endnotes more distracting than footnotes. So, there you go. I've had readers, in the past, extoll* the horrors of footnotes, that they are distracting, destroy the flow of text, and (gasp) feel pretentious (it's all pretentious, kiddos, as it's all pretend, it's all pretense). So, now I'm not sure what I'll do. I guess I'll figure it out when I reach the end of Chapter One. Also, I have considered inserting the Caitlín R. Kiernan construct as "the editor" of Sarah Crowe's journal, which means that I would be writing the prologue, afterword, and foot/endnotes as "me."

I sat out in the sun a bit yesterday, when all the writing was done, just loving the warmth, dozing, soaking up a little Vitamin D. The sun so rarely touches my skin.

Some reader questions now. First eldritch00 writes, "Question about the new Penguin paperback reissues: were all of those novels revised? I remember that Threshold was." Here's how it works: Silk was extensively revised for the mass-market paperback Threshold was revised, but not as much as was Silk. Both Low Red Moon and Murder of Angels received minor edits (more in the former than the latter). Daughter of Hounds will receive almost no revision at all (in part, this is because it doesn't need it, and, in part, because I don't have time).

eldritch00 also asked about the Table of Contents for A is for Alien, and I reply it will probably look something like this (the order of the stories is likely to change):

“Riding the White Bull”
“Zero Summer”
“A Season of Broken Dolls”
“Faces in Revolving Souls”
“The Pearl Diver”
“In View of Nothing”
“Ode to Katan Amano”
“Bradbury Weather”

And, remember, a FREE e-edition of The Dry Salvages will be released by Subterranean Press to coincide with the release of A is for Alien. Also, this from MySpace reader Kate La Trobe:

I always read your blog with interest - have done for years, from London, Holland, the States...wherever I am... and your books of course. You're an incredible inspiration. My favourite is Low Red Moon which I read over many coffees in Amsterdam...am now reading and very much enjoying my recently-acquired Murder of Angels. In Montana! Isn't it great that your work is everywhere?! I always find your books, wherever I am. Usually in shops, and if not, I ask them about your titles and get them to order it in. And there's always Amazon if the worst comes to the worst. Thanks for being fabulously talented. You're enjoyed worldwide.

See? This is what does not make the "Baby Jesus" cry. Yes! I can find your books.

More Millennium last night. Episodes Three and Four. Many more pages of House of Leaves And that was yesterday. Tonight, we get Byron and new Doctor Who and another new Battlestar Galactica. And no, this wasn't a short entry...

* extoll may, indeed, be spelled with two L's, and, to me, extol looks like the name of a neotenic tiger salamander or Aztec god.

First, an apology, of sorts, to the people who read this journal via MySpace. A few days back, MySpace mysteriously jettisoned the login cookie that prevents me having to remember my password and which email account I use for MySpace, and because I do actually rather hate MySpace, it was this morning before I could be bothered to try and remember what was what.

Yesterday, I wrote 1,267 words on Chapter One of The Red Tree. And I think that I have decided that there will not be footnotes, because too many people complain that footnotes break up the flow of the text. Instead, there will be endnotes for each chapter, which are really the same thing as footnotes, only they come at the end of the chapter instead at the foot of each page. Yesterday, I completed the first section of the chapter, and today I will begin the second.

It's that time again, time to point you to the places where you can easily acquire copies of all of my novels, and one of the short-story collections, so that no one has to utter those dreaded words, "I can't find your books." (shudder)

Daughter of Hounds

Silk

Threshold

Low Red Moon

Murder of Angels

Tales of Pain and Wonder

Not a bad day yesterday. I was done with the writing by 4:30 p.m. or so, and it was one of those perfect spring days outside. All those shades of fresh green bursting forth against the blue sky, and the sun so white and dazzling. I left the house for the second day in a row. We walked to Videodrome to return Enchanted (which I still name grotesquely charming). Then we got Thai for dinner, and then we watched the first two episodes of Millennium (now that we're done with Angel). Though I truly loved the second season, I missed most of the first. I think Millennium might have been Chris Carter at his creepiest, and I'm just glad it didn't show up on television until more than two years after I'd written my first Deacon Silvey story.

I passed much of the remainder of the evening in Second Life, rping with the Omegas in Toxian City. Really, it was all too complex and wacky and peculiar to try and recount, though Nareth's victorious battle against the sentient interstellar fungi that had infected her thrall's brain was quite invigorating. Later, Spooky read me more of House of Leaves. "Which is exactly when Karen screams." Such a sublime line. Oh, there was a very brief "absence" seizure following dinner, but I think I'm actually getting used to those little ones. So yes, a fine yesterday.

Today marks the fourth anniversary of my having begun keeping this LiveJournal on 15 April 2004. You can see that entry here, if you're interested. Since that day, I have made 1,706 entries in the journal, received 19,503 comments, and made 5,484 comments of my own. When it began, I was waiting for Murder of Angels to be released and had not yet begun writing Daughter of Hounds. We were living in a loft over in the old Kirkwood school. Of course, this journal, sensu lato, actually goes back to 24 November 2001, when I was just beginning to write Low Red Moon, and Neil talked me into keeping a blog. You can read the very first entry, on Blogger, here.

This line from Danielewski's House of Leaves:

We all create stories to protect ourselves.

I think it's going to end up being an epigraph for The Red Tree. Speaking of which, I spent an hour or so talking over the narrative structure with Spooky yesterday, first person and the problems thereof, the ins and outs of an epistolary narration, and a bit about my protagonist, Sarah Crowe. I already knew that the novel would be set in rural west-central Rhode Island, and after talking with Spooky, I spent an hour or so with Google Earth, tracking down just the right spot. I found it off Barb's Hill Road, north of Coventry, southwest of Foster and Moosup Valley. Unlike all my previous novels, this one shall come close to observing Aristotle's rule regarding "unity of place" in drama. Almost all the story's action will occur on the old farm where Sarah is living. The house standing there now was built around 1850, I think, though it was built on the foundation of a house that was erected on the spot in the late 1700s. After all the talk and Google Earth, I wrote what I hope will prove to be the first 705 words of Chapter One. So, work yesterday.

Having done the Beowulf novelization last year, I'm getting some curious sorts of offers. I've just passed on doing a Guild Wars novel. I will not go tumbling down the slippery slope of media tie-ins.

The postman brought me cover flaps for the mass-market paperback of Daughter of Hounds, which will be released on September 2nd, 2008. It looks good. Also, the signed contracts and IRS forms for the German translations of Threshold and Low Red Moon went into the mail.

Once again, I did not leave the house yesterday. I have to make myself go outside today, as it has now been...almost five days. Spooky spent much of yesterday packing. Yes, the packing has begun. It makes me antsy.

Last night, I watched two episodes of How It's Made on TLC, which I find very oddly soothing. I watched part of an episode of Spongebob Squarepants (which I just find odd). And the rest of the evening went to some rather intense rp with the Omegas in Toxian City (Second Life). Nareth took out her straight razor and gave a...demonstration...in control, and in anatomy, and also in self denial. Her thrall, Nicholette, having committed a rather grave insult against her, was the canvas. It might actually make a nice piece for Sirenia Digest, with just the right sort of tweaking. But, still, I was in bed by 2:30 ayem.

I think I need to read Le Fanu's "Carmilla" again...

Slowly retrieving some of that lost sleep from last week. A full eight hours last night. I'm feeling much, much better, thank you. Sleep deprivation is one of the worst things for me just now, and I've made a new resolution to be in bed by two ayem every night. I may not be asleep, but at least I'll be in bed.

Today, with luck, I will begin writing The Red Tree. I now have four and a half months to write the novel, and I'll easily lose two weeks of that to the move. Yesterday, I finished Michael E. Bell's Food for the Dead: On the Trail of New England's Vampires (2001), a really excellent book treating the folklore of the tuberculosis-related cases of "vampirism" from Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, etc. I first encountered the book at the Peace Dale Public Library (one of the most beautiful libraries in South County) in August 2006, while doing research there, and I scarfed a used copy of the book somewhere or another, but it's taken me this long to get around to reading it.

Yesterday, I also read "Ichnotaxonomy* of bird-like footprints: an example from the Late Triassic-Early Jurassic of Northwest Argentina" in the latest Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. After dinner (Spanish rice with chicken, pintos with jalapeños, fresh avocados and tomato), I did a nice bit of rp with Lorne, Brit, Nicholette, and Artemisia (er...Spooky) in the library in Toxian City. Then Spooky and I watched Danny Boyle's Sunshine for the fourth time. Later still, I organized the hard-drive on my old iBook (Victoria Regina) while she read me a couple more chapters of House of Leaves (this will be our third time through). That was yesterday, pretty much.

Most of the stress during the last couple of weeks has derived from our trying to find a place to live in Providence, a living space suited to our particular needs and my particular aesthetic. We thought we'd found something good in Elmwood, but it turned out not to be so good after all. Don't even get me started on the three front doors. But yesterday, Spooky's mother looked at an apartment near the Armory District, which we think is going to be the place. It's perfect. So, the stress level has lessened considerably. Now, I just have to contemplate the nightmare of packing and making the actual move. We'll likely leave Atlanta sometime between mid and late May, so, not much time left at all.

I've not left the house since we got back from the Colin Meloy show on Thursday night, mostly because the weather turned cold after the thunderstorms on Friday. The warm-up is coming slower than predicted. It's been a chilly spring. I don't think we've had a single day in the '80s (Fahrenheit) yet. Right now, it's 48F, but feels like 42F with the wind chill.

My thanks to David Kirkpatrick (corucia) for the following photo (behind the cut), taken in a local (for him) Barnes and Noble in Minneapolis. I've always been annoyed at authors who measure their success by how many inches their books take up on the shelves of a bookshop, but, after most of these novels went out of print two years ago, seeing them back, seeing that I presently have five novels and a novelization on the shelves (and that they appear to be in the "science fiction and fantasy" section, not "horror"), is somewhat reassuring, I must admit.

( Shelfage )

Oh, and I have this comment from reverendcrofoot, regarding the age of the narrator in The Red Tree: "See, the thing with age is unless the author says it directly it's really hard to tell. I would have never guessed Dancy's age if you hadn't told me...Make her whatever age you want, but just don't tell us how old she is...avoid it. It would be interesting to see the ages people guess."

It would be interesting, perhaps, but I am far too visual and specific in my writing to allow the age of a central character (or most minor ones) to go unstated. How Sarah Crowe will face the trials of the novel, who she is, and so forth, all that stems from the sum of her life experiences, which can be measured, in part, by her age. A twenty-year-old woman would very likely not cope with these experiences the same way that a forty-four-year-old woman would, and much of what concerns me as an author is how a character acts or reacts (truthfully, I would argue action and reaction are synonyms) in any given situation. That was one of the joys of writing "Salammbô Redux (2007)" for the 3rd edition of Tales of Pain and Wonder, having the opportunity to go back and look at a character I first wrote as a preteen, now in her forties. So, interesting idea, but it would never work for me.

Oh, and I think today is the last day to vote in the 2008 Locus Poll & Survey. Many of my short stories are eligible, and Daughter of Hounds made the drop-down menu in the "Best Fantasy Novel" category.

Okay. Time for the juice of the bean.

* An ichnotaxon is a taxon — a family, genus, or species — based solely on evidence derived from fossil footprints (or other traces, such as the burrows left by marine animals). When I lived in Birmingham, back when I was still doing paleontology, I was often aided by Andy Rindsberg, a friend and inchologist, Curator of the paleontological collections of the Alabama State Geological Survey.

I've been making myself go to bed at 2 ayem the last two nights (or mornings), and slowly I am catching up on all the sleep I've lost. Still, here it is 1:12 pm, and I'm still groggy. It's cold in Atlanta this afternoon, but we got marvelous thunderstorms yesterday, and the warm will be back tomorrow, so that's not so bad.

Yesterday. Let's see. It was all about getting Sirenia Digest #28 put together. I did the corrections to "Pickman's Other Model" that I marked when we last read through the story on the 18th, but had not yet made. I have a feeling I'm going to have to read over this one one more time before I send it out into the world. Anyway, that took about an hour and a half. Then I snurched HPL's "Pickman's Model" from Wikisource and spent a bit of time making sure the formatting matched HPL's original (there were some discrepencies), because I want Sirenia readers who haven't read "Pickman's Model" to have it on hand. I gathered up some images I want to use in the issue. I wrote the prolegomena, which is mostly about inspiration. So, it's looking like #28 will go out tomorrow. I still have to do the layout today, and I'm waiting on Vince's illustration. Oh, and this issue will also include, for all those new subscribers, one of the older stories, one of my favourites, "The Sphinx's Kiss" (from #14, January 2007). I think I will be very happy with this issue.

Also, yesterday, the contracts for the German-language editions of Threshold and Low Red Moon arrived. Of course, the IRS still hasn't sent me the forms I need to send to my German publisher to prove that, yes, I really am an American citizen (in order to avoid the hefty German taxes). The post also brought a package from Black Phoenix Alchemy Labs, because Spooky had ordered a bottle of their Baghdad for me (amber, saffron, and bergamot, with mandarin, nutmeg, bulgar rose, musk, and sandalwood), plus a bunch of "imps" (and I'm not gonna list them all, but her faves are Zombi and Séance). Baghdad is the new smell of me.

Last night, there was Manhattan-style clam chowder for dinner, followed by a pretty good episode of Torchwood and a very good episode of Angel ("Damage"). I started reading another JVP paper yesterday — "Cranial anatomy of Ennatosaurus tecton (Synapsida: Caseidae) from the Middle Permian of Russia and the evolutionary relationship of the Caseidae" — but didn't finish it.

Another casualty of the March 14th-15th tornadoes, one I have not yet mentioned, was the second of the two trees in Freedom Park that played an important role in a dream I wrote of way back on March 8th, 2006. Somewhere, there's an entry with a photograph of the two trees standing, but the journal's gotten so long, I'll be damned if I can find it. Anyway, one of the two trees was already dead and fell in storms last year. These two oaks were a bit special to me, because of the dream, and because we'd done some magick there, and they were just very fine trees in their own right (which is the most important thing). There's a photo, taken late on Thursday, behind the cut:

( Fallen )

My thanks to furrylittleprob for pointing me to more LJ icons by artist Liz Amini-Holmes.

Yeah. I hear ya, platypus. Where's my damn coffee?

Postscript (2:34 p.m.) — Thanks to cliff52 for pointing out that the photo of the two trees can be found in my March 10th, 2006 journal entry (third photo down).

Sir Arthur C. Clarke has died. From 2001: A Space Odyssey to Childhood's End, a notable influence on my own writing, on themes addressed in my own sf, and a remarkable human being.

---

We made it all the way through the proofreading of "Pickman's Other Model" yesterday (44 ms. pp.; for Sirenia Digest #28). But between my cough and Spooky aching ear, we did not get to "The Ape's Wife" or begin reading the A is for Alien ms. That'll be today.

And, again, here are the links for my books, those presently in print, the most recent editions, the ones I have to worry about sales figures for:

Daughter of Hounds

Silk

Threshold

Low Red Moon

Murder of Angels

Tales of Pain and Wonder

---

There resides in our freezer the remains of a Peep that we began either experimenting upon or torturing (take your pick) way back in either 2003 or 2004. It's been subjected to microwaves and repeated freezing and thawing, over four or five years now. Amazingly, you can still see its "eyes." It stands as my salute to Corporate Xtian Holidays Stolen From Pagan Sources©. And as proof of the durability of certain supposed foodstuffs. There are two photos (warning — nasty) behind the cut, which Spooky took day before yesterday:

( not food )

---

Ostara is upon us again. If she's up to it, Spooky and I will observe the sabbat Friday night.

And there's really not much else to be said for now. It's grey and dreary out, not quite cold, not quite warm, and I'm wishing I were anywhere but here; okay, well, not anywhere....

I've just gotten word that Steve Jones is taking "The Ape's Wife" for The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror (#19). This will mark my ninth appearance in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror since 1998. And I love this particular story so much, I'm very glad to see it make the cut.

And, in case you've not already figured it out, no, the tornado did not suck us away to Oz last night. But we did lose power for a while. Most of the damage was downtown and to the west, south and east of us. We got a terrific thunderstorm, with hail. Even as I type this, a new line of storms is bearing down on the city, but hopefully nothing like what came through last night.

Not much to report about yesterday, except that my hair is all red again. And my editor is as baffled as I as to why you cannot yet order the new edition of Murder of Angels from Amazon.com, and she's looking into it (but, hey, that's why we have Barnes & Noble). Oh, and last night we watched Alison Chernick's documentary, Matthew Barney: No Restraint (2006), about the making of Barney's Drawing Restraint 9 (2005). Fortunately, one of the iBooks had enough juice to play a DVD, so we did not perish of boredom.

On Thursday, well, tons of the busyness of writing, including an interview for the Fearzone website. The uncorrected draft of "Pickman's Other Model" was sent to Vince to illustrate for Sirenia Digest #28. I think the rest was too dull to bear mentioning, no matter how much of it there was.

And if you're an SL steampunk, do not forget that Monday is Air Kraken Day. Don't worry. I'll take pictures.

Okay, well, Spooky says I need a bath, and she's willing to help, so shut up, Herr Platypus, it'll all still be here waiting for me afterwards...

Here are the links to the latest editions of all my books, the ones I need to sell so that there will be future books:

Daughter of Hounds

Silk

Threshold

Low Red Moon

Murder of Angels

Tales of Pain and Wonder

Yesterday was a much-needed day off. On Tuesday, I wrote a very respectable 1,665 words and reached THE END of "Pickman's Other Model" (total word count, 9,892). And that made eight straight days of writing, and at least eleven days since my last "day off." I very much like how the story turned out, subtler than I'd planned, more suggested than shown — you know the drill. And you can read it in Sirenia Digest #28, if you've subscribed, and if not, that's easy to fix.

Obama took Mississippi, which I entirely expected, but am pleased with, nonetheless.

Yesterday, the postman or UPS or somebody delivered my comp copies of of the mass-market paperback 2nd edition of Murder of Angels. And even though the book has a street date of April 1st, Amazon is still not taking orders. I suspect this is because they bought so many remaindered copies of the tpb, the ones that I was supposed to be able to buy, but couldn't, because my former editor "forgot" to let me know, etc. Regardless, Barnes & Noble is now taking orders, and you can order a copy just by following this link. And if you can, please do, because I'd like these editions to stay in print a while. I like how the mass-market paperback turned out. I'd forgotten, until yesterday, that I actually began this book in 2001, then shelved it and wrote Low Red Moon in 2002, and only came back to Murder of Angels in 2003. How do you forget a thing like that?

Not enough sleep last night. I really have to make an effort to be in bed by 2 ayem or so until this upcoming appearance is done (no matter how unnatural going to bed at 2 may feel). Originally, today was to have been spent shopping, finding a couple of outfits for the trip to Maryland next weekend, because I've not made anything like a public appearance since November 2004 (except the Lovecraft documentary thing last April). But there's a bunch of the busyness of writing I must attend to today, instead. And it's actually a relief, because I hate shopping for clothes that much.

So, yesterday Spooky and I made a 2 p.m. matinée of Roland Emmerich's 10,000 BC (a date that marks the beginning of the Mesolithic, by the way). This is slightly odd, because I do so despise the films of Roland Emmerich. Still, I've seen most of them at least once. Independence Day? Hated it. The Day After Tomorrow? Hated it. Stargate and Universal Soldier and Godzilla? Let's not even go there. Anyway, I've had a thing for the "cave man" subgenre since I was a kid, and after seeing those gorgeous shots of mammoth and phorusrhacid birds, how could I stay away, Roland Emmerich or no? And I went in with the mindset that this was the sort of story that Edgar Rice Burroughs or Robert E. Howard or H. Rider Haggard might have written, a sort of big-budget Conanesque thing. And as it turns out, it is pretty much exactly that. And having gone in with that set of expectations, and much to my surprise, I actually enjoyed the film. It's not a Very Good Movie, but it's great eye candy, and it's exactly the sort of film ERB or REH would have written. It helps that I've had a thing for Cliff Curtis since The Fountain (2006) and Sunshine (2007). And that the creature SFX are really quite good. Yes, the science is shit. The history is absurd. The geography is even screwed up. And one could also make arguments concerning sexism and the problem of "Mighty Whitey" coming to the rescue, but, and still, taking the film strictly on its own merits, as what I think it was intended to be, it mostly succeeds, which is more than I can say for any other film this man has directed. Well, the no-sacrifice ending was sort of a cop out, that's true (and compounded the absurdities). Point is, I had fun, and I think, these days, films are so expensive, especially SFX extravaganzas (and 10,000 BC cost a whopping $140 million), and there's so much bullshit hype, that it's hard to just enjoy what should merely be a popcorn movie, a big dumb bit of fun. Anyway, I never thought I'd live long enough to enjoy a Roland Emmerich film.

Later, we had a good walk in Freedom Park (and saw two of our local red-tailed hawks). Then lots of rp in Toxia, and two more episodes of Angel ("Calvary" and "Salvage"). A decent enough day off, all in all. There will be fewer and fewer of these as June approaches. Anyway, yes, many annoying things to be done today, and the platypus just reminded me that talking about cave-man movies will not make them go away. Oh, and if you've said that you want to be part of the Sirenia Players, and you've told me so but have not yet received an invitation, please, please remind me again (and give me your SL username). Right now, we have 13 members, but more are welcome.

A very good writing day yesterday. I did 1,477 words on "Pickman's Other Model," finishing the fourth section of the story and also the fifth. Which means I should be able to get the "first draft" done before my eyebrow appointment at 4:45 p.m. Spooky and Sonya (sovay) have been reading this one as I go, and they both like it. My only misgiving is that I think I'll have written a story in eight days that actually needed about fourteen. The layers and details, the artifice of nonexistent documents and films, a hundred things I'd really like to go back and explore a bit more. I have begun to recognize an odd similarity between this story and "Houses Under the Sea," but I don't know if anyone else will see it. Anyway, it'll be appearing in Sirenia Digest #28 later this month.

Last night we found a dosage of dextromethorphan that appears to keep this cough in check, but it's interacting with my other meds to produce a very curious, floaty sort of high. Not unpleasant, mind you, and at this point, just about anything is better than the blasted cough. But I wound up sitting here at my desk late last night, also sitting on a sofa there in the library in Toxia...just sitting. No rp, because the library was pretty much deserted by then, except for me. I sat here listening to Poe and the new NIN, watching Nareth on that sofa, and Spooky finally came in about 3 ayem (she'd been reading in the bedroom), to see what the hell I was doing. I muttered something lame about leveling up. But, truthfully, I was just sitting here, watching my avatar sitting there, tripping on the pharmacological cocktail in my blood and brain. Then, however, I didn't get to sleep until almost four, I woke up at 10:30 ayem, and now I'm feeling pretty zombiefied.

Once again, the correct links to the new paperback editions of my novels (those now in print):

Daughter of Hounds

Silk

Threshold

Low Red Moon

After the writing, I did a little Second Life. The "Sirenia Players" group now has eight members, and a ninth who has not yet accepted her invitation. So, it's coming along. Last night, Spooky made chili, and then we watched two more eps of Angel, Season Four ("Apocalypse Nowish" and "Habeas Corpses"). The show has certainly veered into grimmer territory, and that's a good thing.

I've not left the house in two days, but the weather is warm again. Hopefully, we'll get a good walk this evening. Oh, and if you're waiting on an email from me, I've gotten just a little behind, but should get caught up today.

As I type this, Sirenia Digest #27 is being PDFed, so subscriber's should expect the February issue to be showing up in their inboxes this evening. And if you are not a subscriber, turn not pale, beloved snail, for it's not yet too late to get this issue and all those to come. Just sign up today. Back issues are also available, upon request.

Good riddance, February. Usually, February is the month when I begin to feel hope, as the grey veil of winter finally begins to lift. Usually, February is the month I look forward to, after the long night of December and January. This year, however, I think February has tried to fucking kill me, and I can be done with it not one moment too soon. So, go, February. Get out. Enough already.

Yesterday I received the very, very good news that Anne, my editor at Penguin, has extended my deadline on Joey Lafaye from June 1st to September 1st, which is far more than merely a great relief. The recent...shall we say, hindrances...had made it impossible for me to make the previous deadline (and this, actually, is a deadline that had been extended once already). Now, I find myself given the time I need to write the book. But there is not time to lose another month to hindrances. I will be guarding against them with all the powers at my disposal.

Not much else to say about yesterday. We're dealing with the tedium of having the IRS prove to the German government that I'm an American citizen, so that my German publisher (for Low Red Moon and Threshold) can pay me without my having to turn over sizable portions of the advance to Germany for taxes. I went through this with the Italian edition of Threshold, and now I'm going through it again, and it just sort of pisses me off. Today, we finished deciphering Form 8802 and got it in the mail, so that they'll send me Form 6166, so maybe, someday, I can get paid.

I've mostly been staying clear of Second Life the last couple of weeks, as the Dune sim in which I'd invested so much energy crashed and burned and, finally, mercifully, ceased to exist, because the Fremen faction refused to submit to the idiotic whim of the "Council" and become pacifist hillbillies (long, long story). Having disentangled myself from that shameful mess, I just wanted to step back from SL for a bit. But last night, I ventured back into the Toxia sim, the city of demons and angels where I play the parthenogenically spawned offspring of a cyborg and a Nephilim. I spent most of the evening (as a member of the Omega Institute, which is a bit like the Talamasca, I suppose) pursuing a strange albino girl named Diva, who has a curious penchant for polka dots (which she is convinced protect her from sunlight). There are even a couple of screencaps (large ones), behind the cut. Later still, in the city morgue, Nareth freely surrendered her eyes to one of the Omega praetors, a demon named Lorne, to serve as a physical component in a complex protective ward that is being woven to protect the library from hostile incursions. It was the first good rp I've had since early February.

( Nareth and the Girl from the Circus )

But yes, Sirenia Digest #27 will be along shortly, and now Spooky is calling me away for dinner and Kindernacht. Oh, and I almost forgot. Please do have a look at the current eBay auctions. Thank you!