Next week, I'm going to be in Texas for a mini book tour.

I'll be signing at the Hastings in San Angelo, TX at 7pm on Wednesday, April 4th:
http://www.facebook.com/events/288566907871666/

They're only going to have the novels in my Jessie Shimmer urban fantasy series on hand, so if you have anything else you'd like signed, feel free to bring it in.

I'll also be signing at the Arboretum B&N in Austin, TX from 2pm-4pm on Saturday, April 7th:
http://www.facebook.com/events/255583457850063/
http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/event/3231229

Please drop by to say "hi" if you're in the area!

You can download a 55-page excerpt of my forthcoming novel Switchblade Goddess over at Scribd:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/75874469/SWITCHBLADE-GODDESS-by-Lucy-Snyder-Excerpt


You can also find my Take Five discussion of the book over at Suvudu:

http://sf-fantasy.suvudu.com/2011/12/take-five-with-lucy-snyder-author-switchblade-goddess.html

My third novel, Switchblade Goddess, will be in stores on December 27th ... this book picks up right where Shotgun Sorceress left off. The story features the continued adventures of Jessie Shimmer, her familiar Pal, Cooper Marron, and The Warlock.

And of course it includes lots more of their antagonist Miko, who is featured on the cover and in the title this time around:



The novel has gotten some good praise so far:

"Snyder injects this edgy urban fantasy with an erotic charge and a horrific flavor, creating a space where sex and terror coexist and no comfort zone is within sight." (read more)
- Publishers Weekly

"Lucy Snyder attacks the page with the raw, manic intensity of an early Sam Raimi. This book is funny, profane, and insane in all the best ways."
- Seanan McGuire

Yes, the reviewer at PW and Seanan did read the same book! The humor in my fiction is often pretty dark, and can read as horror if a person doesn't share my admittedly somewhat twisted sensibilities. And that's fine; I'm all about alternate interpretations.

If you'd like to read a free excerpt, please visit the book's page on my website and scroll down a little; this option requires Flash:

http://www.sff.net/people/lucy-snyder/switchblade.html

And, if you'd like to enter a contest to win a free copy of the novel, head on over to Goodreads:

http://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/17860-switchblade-goddess

The giveaway closes on January 6th.

I am not one to automatically assume advertising is inherently evil. At its base, any ad is an act of saying "Here's this thing you might like." It's when you get into lies about the nature of the product, exhortations to blind consumerism and other social manipulations in the message of the ad that things get icky.

I would, for instance, like to put most holiday ads into a gigantic Santa bag with lots of bricks and drop them into the deepest trench in the ocean. I'm considering just not watching TV, which is a completely unshocking concept to most of you but I've managed to get myself hooked on The Food Pr0n Network for reasons that are obscure to me and probably don't say good things about my mental state. On some fundamental level I really must know what those plucky, resourceful, sweaty chefs on "Chopped" are going to do with aardvark meat, pickle juice, marshmallow fluff, and pencil shavings.

Maybe I should go do something with my family instead. But ah -- I don't have any except for Gary, and my distant father. And that cuts to the second worst part about holiday ads (first worst thing being the CONSUME NOW! message when the planet is clogged with garbage and most of us are broke): the relentless emphasis on family: happy family outings, happy family gatherings, friends and family good cheer.

I have nothing against family. But if you don't have one -- or if yours is irreparably fractured or dysfunctional -- holiday ads have this way of rubbing your face in it all.

TV: "Buy your mom something special this holiday season at JARED!"
Lonely Person: "Fuck you, JARED, my mom's dead!"

And some ads are just plain smarmy and bad. Car ads are often pretty lousy (from an advertising perspective) in that they're sleek and shiny and expensive and when they're over you have no clue what the advertisement was for. If you haven't linked the product in the consumer's mind the ad is a failure. But what's worse is an ad that DOES put the product in the consumer's mind, but links it to negative traits.

Like, being massive assholes:

http://youtu.be/yL5pxsqs3kQ


Way to go, Audi.

CGP and I just made ebook versions of my collections Sparks and Shadows, Chimeric Machines, and Installing Linux on a Dead Badger available for purchase at Goodreads. Those who are interested in the books should go to the pages for each title and then click on the green "download ebook" button:

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2088596.Sparks_and_Shadows

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2101819.Installing_Linux_on_a_Dead_Badger

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6410641-chimeric-machines


You can preview a portion of each ebook in your web browser. The versions on Goodreads are the same as the ones available through Amazon and Smashwords etc.

On Sunday, July 17th at 3:00 pm, I'll be signing copies of my novels SPELLBENT and SHOTGUN SORCERESS (any my small press stuff, too!) at the B&N at La Cantera in San Antonio, TX. The store's on the northwest side of the 1604 outer loop, right beside the UT San Antonio campus.

I may also be reading an excerpt from my forthcoming novel SWITCHBLADE GODDESS.

For more info:

http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/event/3102334

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=119540781464582

Context 24 will be taking place in Columbus, Ohio at the Doubletree Hotel (the same venue as last year) the weekend of August 26-28, 2011.

Guests who've signed on include L.E. Modesitt, Jr., Mira Grant (aka Seanan McGuire), David Hartwell, Erica Neely, Tom Smith, Mike Resnick, Nigel Sade, and Susan Fisher. I'll be participating as a panelist.

They still have dealers' tables:

http://www.contextsf.org/dealer.htm

They have posted a proposed list of panel topics and a panelist registration form on the front page of their site; the deadline for panelist signup is July 15th:

http://www.contextsf.org/

And finally, they've posted ten writing workshops; a few more are likely to be posted in coming months:

http://www.contextsf.org/workshop.htm

Topics include:

Building Narrative Tension
How To Polish Your Novel Manuscript
Characterization and Dialog
Release Your Inner Teen: Writing Fiction for the Young Adult Market
Level One Writers Workshop
Pitches and Blurbs and Tag Lines, Oh My!
The Devil is in the Details
Engaging the Wary: Winning and Keeping the Impatient Reader
The Art, Craft and Business of Writing Genre Fiction
Character Torture 101
Pissing Off Editors, or How Not to Get Published

Those of you who follow my personal account on Facebook may recall that I wrote 7600 words in a single 24-hour period a few months back. A couple of weeks later, I wrote 11,000 words over a weekend. Yeah. I'm a binge writer. Here's how I do it:

http://horrorworld.org/hw/2011/05/a-guide-to-binge-writing/

Also, I'm guest blogging over at Kelly Harmon's site in honor of the forthcoming release of the nonfiction writing book Many Genres, One Craft. My post is all about attending and coordinating conventions:

http://kellyaharmon.com/genres-craft-writing-conferences-part-ii/

First, Amazon is selling my collection Sparks and Shadows at a massive (55%) discount today ... I doubt you can get it new for a lower price:

http://amzn.to/f197V9

Also, my third Jessie Shimmer novel (Switchblade Goddess) will be coming out on December 27th, 2011. The cover art is done, thanks to the talented Dan Dos Santos, but I haven't gotten the go-ahead from the publisher that the cover can be shared publicly. The novel picks up right where Shotgun Sorceress left off, and the cover (and the title) feature Jessie's nemesis Miko, who readers will be seeing a whole lot more of in this book.

Once I've finished the edits etc. for Switchblade Goddess, I'm going to be working on some new stories featuring Jessie, Cooper, the Warlock, Opal, Randall, and Kai for my forthcoming collection Orchid Carousals.

So, I checked my Seton Hill University email and found this in a message with no subject line (always include a subject to avoid ending up in a spam filter!):

Hello my name is ----. I'm a senior at ------ High School. I'm doing a research paper about a career in fiction writing, and I was wondering if you could answer some questions I had.

His opening is polite, to the point and properly spelled -- all that's great! -- but with no individualized salutation attached it makes me wonder if I'm just one of a dozen writers this kid has fired off the same email to. It could be he just didn't know whether to call me Ms. Snyder or Mrs. Snyder or Professor Snyder and decided just to omit the personalization entirely to avoid making a mistake ... or it could have been a symptom of him being lazy when he sent his query to lots of people at once.

( Read more... )

So, my take-home message for people seeking to interview authors is this: be polite (of course!), but also avoid giving the impression that you've just spammed them. Use a correct salutation and include something like "research query" or "interview query" in your subject line.

If you have more than five questions, politely ask first if you can send questions, then send them once the author agrees. Otherwise, you're relying on the author being in an exceptionally generous mood, and perhaps slightly drunk, the latter of which will almost certainly affect the quality of the responses you receive.

Also, make your inquiry well before your paper is due, and thank the author once you receive your response.