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Friday, February 19th, 2010 Catherine Asaro created this awesome flyer for the Library of Congress reading on March 3. Isn’t it beautiful? (The pic of me is about three haircuts ago…but it’s still a “fairly good” representation. I hate to have my photo taken!) Hope to see you there! 
Thursday, February 18th, 2010 I’ll be reading at the Library of Congress in March with a bunch of writing giants! (Or, should I say Amazons, since they’re all women?) I’m very excited! There’s going to be a book signing afterward. My first “official” signing. It couldn’t happen at a cooler place. Of course I’ll be reading from Blood Soup. If there’s time, I may read some from The Dragon’s Clause. Here’s the published notice:
What IF… Science Fiction & Fantasy Forum
presents Science Fiction and Fantasy from Broad Universe Featuring Authors: • Catherine Asaro • Ellen Kushner • Sue Lange • Kelly A. Harmon Wednesday, March 3, 2010, 12:10 – 1:00 pm A book signing will follow. Request ADA accommodations five business days in advance at (202) 707-6362 TTY or ADA@locdotgov. Contact Nate Evans at natev@loc.gov for more information. Broad Universe is an international organization of women and men dedicated to celebrating and promoting the work of women writers of science fiction, fantasy and horror. Monday, February 15th, 2010
We get the picture. There’s no such thing as global warming. Now, please stop. Signed, The Northeastern United States and Beyond Just when I thought it was safe to go outside again…the snow makes another appearance. It’s hard to believe it’s snowing again (and that another storm is predicted for next weekend). We’ve had a bit of thaw since the last, but not much. Most of the road are finally clear. The animals have just started venturing out again. I’m really not up to shoveling anymore. [The pic was taken by a friend of the family down in southern Maryland on Thursday 2/11/2010.] Sunday, February 14th, 2010 I’m sad. Dick Francis has died. I whiled away a lot of summertime hours in the tree house reading Dick Francis books. Here’s a link to the BBC obit. Sunday, February 14th, 2010
The Broads over at Broad Universe are launching their “Rapid Fire Readings” into the PodVerse for your listening pleasure. A “rapid fire reading” or “RFR” is a session of five-to-seven authors each reading a five-minute section of a story they’ve written…just a little “taste” of what they’re up to. The Broads have a full line-up of podcasts they’ll be doing this year, starting off with this one. Of course, the theme is romance. Here’s the link to BroadProd. Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
Not that I didn’t get anything done. I simply spread the eight hours of “to do” over the weekend, in between shoveling snow, enjoying hot cups of coffee and viewing a bit of the Superbowl. (Weren’t the commercials terrible this year? I swear I’m going to stop watching them…) Here’s how my to-do list looks:
These were the extra activities I’d planned if there were time:
It turned out to be quite a productive weekend. I managed to do some other writerly stuff, too:
Tuesday, February 9th, 2010 We were hit with just shy of 30 inches of snow on Friday and Saturday. It was undeniably pretty…for about the first 10 inches…and then things got hairy. 
Luckily, we didn’t lose power (as we have so many times)–there’s a reason we keep a generator handy in the garage. But keeping up with the shoveling proved exhausting. We have a huge snowblower – you’ll see why we do in the driveway picture below….our drive is more than 400 feet long and has an incline of about 30 degrees. It’s no easy feat to clear off after a big snow. When a big snow comes along, we blow it off every few hours…but this storm came through in the wee hours of the morning. We focused on keeping the heat pumps clear. We still couldn’t keep the ice from forming on them. To get to the snow early Saturday morning, we had to shovel a path for the blower to go up the drive. Then we could let it do its work…but the wet, slushy snow underneath couldn’t be thrown. Here’s a shot of my husband’s hands nearly an hour after we’d come in. Four-plus hours of shoveling and snow-blower wrangling will do this to you. I shoveled just as much, but my hands weren’t so bad.  We managed to clear a path wide enough for a vehicle, but the pad below and the sides of the drive we let go. Finally, we called a snow plow to do the rest of the work. Here are some shots of the snow around the area, nothing pretty…just a few photos to show you the depth. 
It’s currently snowing…and the weather guys are predicting 10-to-18 more inches. Should be interesting! Sunday, February 7th, 2010 I just heard from my editor for “The Complete Guide to Writing Paranormal” and it looks like the ARCs (Advanced Reading Copies) are complete. That means publication isn’t too far off! The project had been slated for publication last fall, so I’m tickled to see it finally coming together. Apparently, there was too much information by authors for a single book, so the one volume has been split it into two:
I have a chapter in the second volume: Undead, Cursed and Inhuman. (I have to admit, I like that title much better than Spirits, Sprites and Spooks. I think it sounds “tougher.” I didn’t get a choice, of course, but I’m pleased.) And, judging from the TOC (table of contents), mine’s the last chapter in the book: “Critique Groups: One Spark to Better Writing.” I’ll post cover art when I receive it. Saturday, February 6th, 2010
I just learned that my story “Selk Skin Deep” has been accepted for the Bad Ass Fairies III anthology, subtitled, “In All Their Glory”. I’m very excited! Bad Ass Fairies 2 – Just Plain Bad won the 2009 Eppie Award. I’ll be in very good company as part of the third in the series. Selkies are fairies from Irish and Scottish mythology, thought to have originated in northern Scottland in the Orkney and Shetland Islands. Selkies are seals, living in the sea, but are able to shed their skin and become human. The most common selkie tale is a romantic tragedy wherein a selkie female comes ashore and has her seal skin stolen. Unable to return to the sea, she marries and has children – usually with the man who stole her skin. Years later, she finds her skin and dons it, returning to the sea and leaving her human family behind. “Selk Skin Deep” is an alternate history that takes place during the Vietnam War, at which time President Kennedy first created the Navy SEALs program. In my story, Cade Owen is not only a SEAL, but a Selkie, who’s been assigned duty on the aircraft carrier USS Livingstone in the Gulf of Tonkin. Friday, February 5th, 2010
This is the “official” beginning of the Write Your @ss Off weekend. I hope to accomplish as much today as I did last Friday…although my time might be cut short. The northeast (and probably elsewhere) is expecting a doozy of a snowstorm — perhaps more than two feet of snow in my area — and I may need to sign off and do some “because of the snow” things. Because of that, I’m keeping my main list short, and my “if there’s time” list long. What I can’t accomplish today, I intend to get done this weekend. (If the weather guys are correct, I should have nothing better to do this weekend anyway–bring on the snow!) Here are my plans:
If there’s time left in the day, I will:
How does Write Your @ss Off work? This is from JES over at Running After My Hat.
At last count, there were nearly 60 people joining in this weekend. Why don’t you join us, anonymously, or officially. See my last post on WYAO for all the details. If you sign up officially, don’t forget to drop me a line. |
…enough already!
How would you like a little romance with your science fiction, fantasy and horror?
My official “Write Your @ss Off” day was Friday…but my glee at having eight hours of uninterrupted writerly stuff was crushed under the weight of nearly 30 inches of snow.
