Swan Tower

Design Your Own Dragon ends tomorrow night! Get your entry in while the getting is good . . . .

Me, I’m home from tour. The fact that I am exceedingly glad to be back has more to do with the wear and tear of shifting from hotel to airport to cab to store than to do with the tour events themselves, which were splendid. Mary Robinette Kowal and I drew some pretty good crowds together, and it turns out we make for compatible traveling companions — which was by no means a guarantee! We’d met a couple of times before, at conventions and such, and of course our books make a good pairing with each other . . . but that didn’t necessarily mean we’d get along on the road. Despite Mary having her own hashtag for travel woes, I quite liked traveling with her. It turns out we see eye-to-eye on a number of fronts, ranging from fiction to how early we should get to the airport, and that’s valuable when you’re spending a week and a half together and suffering the aforementioned wear and tear.

Plus! There were costumes! And dragon bones!

I foolishly did not get anyone to take photos on my own phone, so rather than stealing other people’s pictures, I will link you to them. This report at A Truant Disposition shows the whole thing pretty well, from my dress and Mary’s to our respective song-and-dance bit (a mini puppet show on her part, a mini naturalist lecture on mine). Geeky Library has some more, and I quite like this photo from @ghostwritingcow on Twitter. The “dragon bones” are the thing I alluded to before the tour: Mary suggested I obtain replica dinosaur fossils from Skulls Unlimited, and use them as dragon substitutes. For the curious, the skull and the smaller claw are from a velociraptor, while the tooth is from a T-Rex and the larger claw is from a megaraptor. (The tiny skull, which I don’t think got photographed, is actually supposed to be a “dragon skull;” Mary picked it up at a natural history museum in Utah.)

Touring is a lot more fun in company, I have to say. Not only does it jazz up the event itself, by giving you somebody to riff off of, it does a lot to mitigate the “oh god I’m in another airport” drudgery of the travel itself. So props to Tor for putting us together, and I hope for a chance to do something like this again in the future.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

The full schedule for my joint tour with Mary Robinette Kowal has been posted at Tor.com:

Thursday, May 1, 6:00 p.m.
DePaul University
Chicago, IL

Friday, May 2, 7:00 p.m.
University Bookstore
Seattle, WA

Saturday, May 3, 2:00 p.m.
Powell’s Books at Cedar Hill Crossing
Portland, OR

Sunday, May 4, 3:00 p.m.
Book Bin
Salem, OR

Tuesday, May 6, 6:30 p.m.
Murder by the Book
Houston, TX

Thursday, May 8, 6:00 p.m.
Weller Book Works
Salt Lake City, UT

Saturday, May 10, 2:00 p.m.
Mysterious Galaxy (Part of the Mysterious Galaxy 21st Birthday Bash!)
San Diego, CA

Sunday, May 11, 3:00 p.m.
Borderlands Books
San Francisco, CA

And I would like to state for the record that Mary is a genius. She made a suggestion for something I could do during the events which — well, you’ll just have to wait and see, won’t you? (Yes, this is my transparent bid to build suspense and get you all to come.) I promise I’ll talk about it after the tour, for those of you who don’t live anywhere near our stops or can’t make it to the events, but for now you’ll just have to wonder. (Hint: it involves my husband marveling, once again, at what kinds of things can be written off as business expenses for a writer.)

Also, there’s a new interview with me up at Just a World Away, in which I talk a little bit about Voyage of the Basilisk (among other things).

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

I’m not doing a giant blog tour like last year, but I have contrived to be in a few places around the Internet recently:

1) On the Tor/Forge blog, These Are a Few of My Favorite Dragons. Can you guess which ones I picked? (Before you click on the link to see, of course.)

2) On Tor.com — not to be confused with the Tor/Forge blog — I participated in a series called “That Was Awesome! Writers on Writing.” The point of the series is to talk about awesome moments in other people’s books, perfect little twists or amazing scenes that just blew you away. Head on over to see what I chose. (Many of you, I think, will not be surprised in the slightest . . . .)

3) On Lawrence M. Schoen’s site, another post series, this one with the ominous title of “Eating Authors,” and the much less ominous theme of “writers talk about the fabulous meals they’ve had.” I chose to discuss the kaiseki meal Starlady took us to in Kyoto. Eight tiny courses of phenomenally good Japanese food, enough to make a gourmand weep for joy.

4) Okay, this one’s old, but I realized I’d forgotten to link to it when it first went up: Timing is the bane of existence” at SFNovelists. On the unexpected pitfalls of figuring out, not what will happen in your book, but when it will happen.

5) Not a link, but a reminder: I’ll be at FOGcon this weekend, and at Borderlands Books on Sunday at 7 p.m. I hope to see one or more of you there!

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

Ladies and gentlebeings, I will be doing a reprise of last year’s promotional book tour. Like all sequels, this one is Bigger! Better! with More Explosions Costumes!

I will be touring in company with the inestimable Mary Robinette Kowal, to support the release of The Tropic of Serpents (on my part) and Valour and Vanity (on her part). There will be readings and Q&As. There will be period-appropriate clothing. There may be a dragon puppet. There will certainly be me desperately wishing I was as good of a performer as Mary is.

Here’s the schedule, as it stands right now:

• May 1, Thursday, Chicago, IL, DePaul University
• May 2, Friday, Seattle, WA, University Book Store
• May 3, Saturday, 2pm, Portland, OR, Powell’s
• May 4, Sunday, 3pm, Salem, OR, Book Bin
• May 6, Tuesday, 6:30 pm, Houston, TX, Murder by the Book
• May 8, Thursday, 6pm, Salt Lake City, UT, Weller Book Works
• May 10, Saturday, San Diego, CA, Mysterious Galaxy
• May 11, Sunday, 3pm, San Francisco, CA, Borderlands

I’m told that the San Diego event will be part of a larger birthday celebration for Mysterious Galaxy, where we’ll be joined by other authors. Other than that, I don’t know anything more than what you’ve got right there, but I’ll definitely keep you all posted as details firm up.

Bay Area locals take note: I will also be doing a separate event at Borderlands on March 8th, to mark the release of The Tropic of Serpents earlier that week. Again, more details as I have them.

Now if you’ll pardon me, I need to go arrange for a suitable costume . . . .

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

‘Twas @AdrianTurtle on Twitter, with Puff the Magic Dragon.

(That sounds like a solution from Clue.)

Thank you to all who responded! It was nifty, seeing the spread of answers.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

‘Tis the season — the season in which every writer-blog you read features a list of what that writer published in the previous year, in case you’re looking to nominate things for awards.

I had a book. You may have noticed me talking about it once or twice. A Natural History of Dragons feels like forever ago, since I’m nearing the end of a draft of #3 in that series, but it was in fact just last year.

I also had two short stories, both courtesy of Mike Allen’s editorial efforts:

“The Wives of Paris,” which was in Mythic Delirium and can be read in its entirety at that link, and

“What Still Abides,” which was in Clockwork Phoenix 4 and has gotten a surprising amount of praise. (I guess there’s a bigger audience for stories written in Anglish than I expected.)

Not a vast quantity, but I’m quite pleased with all three.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

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