Category: News of Note

It’s been raining here in Oregon, lots and lots of rain, which is really the best sign that Fall is fully upon us.  It also signals to me that it’s about time to do another quarterly update.

Part of the reason I do these updates is just for my own sake, since my own personal, off-line journal contains a lot of random observations and musings that make getting a general overview of what was going on in my life and with my writing at a particular time a bit harder to discern.  Nice to be able to just scan the “news” category on the blog.   There’s also lots of whining in my personal journal about random trivial stuff which really doesn’t put me in the most flattering light.  I mean, let’s face it:  I don’t need extra help making myself less flattering.

I also assume since you’re reading this that you might have some interest in what’s going on here at Mutterings Central.  Either that or you just Googled “Oregon” and “lots of rain” and it led you here.  There’s always that, I suppose.

Anyway, the big news from the previous few months is that I sold my second novel to a major publisher, Wooden Bones, about the amazing things that happened to Pinocchio after he became a real boy.  It’s scheduled for a summer 2012 release, so it’ll be a while yet.  Sorry folks, that’s Big Publishing for you.  Very excited about this one, though.  It has the type of high concept, highly commercial angle that got lots of folks in New York excited.  Hope it’s worth the wait.

Other than that, just got back from 10 days spent on the Oregon coast.  The first few days were spent co-teaching a technology workshop for writers with bestselling writer Dean Wesley Smith.  If you read my article about why it’s a great time to be a writer, then you already have some idea what this workshop was about — creating websites, publishing to all the major electronic formats, and using print on demand effectively.  Really, it probably should have been called “How to Start Your Own Modern Publishing Company,” because that’s what it boiled down to in essence.  It was an amazing group of writers, around 30 or so, and from all over the country.  When these folks get ramped up, New York publishing is never going to know what hit them.

Speaking of that, I’m ramping up some of my own efforts in that regard, which I’ll be writing about here in the coming months.  I’m still a big believer in targeting those big corporate behemoths, largely because they’re very good at getting books in front of a large number of people in a very short time span, but there are lots of other options available to writers now.  I’ll be writing more about how I’m taking advantage of these options in the future, but for now just let me say how empowering it is.  Publishers may be panicked about what the future brings, and bookstores depressed, but writers have more options than ever.

After the workshop, I spent a week working on another fantasy for young readers.  It was great to be able to focus soley on the writing, while also hanging out with a bunch of smart and talented writers there on the coast.  The productivity engines have been moderately good lately; if I keep it up at this pace, this will be my best word count year yet.

What else?  Raking leaves.  Stocking the candy bowl for the trick-or-treaters tomorrow night.  Helping the daughter with piano lessons and tricky math questions.  Teaching the boy how to read.   Agonizing over continued car bills.  Still grieving the loss of our orange tabby, Mangerine, who’d been with us 15 years and died peacefully of natural causes.   Shaking my head at all the political silliness and trying to get myself to stop caring about politics so much since it’s so dispiriting — and failing, of course.

Which is a good thing, I guess.  If you can get yourself to stop caring, then you’re probably dead as a writer — and really not so well off as a human being either.

I’m famous!  I’m famous!  Okay, just a little.

Our local newspaper, which has a circulation around 50,000, ran an interview with me in Sunday’s paper. With a photo and everything.

http://www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20100815/LIFE/8150308/1001/NEWS/A–Getaway–for-young-adults

I think it came off fairly well, though after doing a couple interviews now I’ve realized how easy it is to misinterpret something.  This isn’t the fault of the reporter, who I think did a good job, but more my fault for letting myself ramble a little too much and not realizing that, well, I was talking to a reporter.  For example, you might get the sense reading the article that I can take the whole summers off from my job at the university and loaf around my house in my flip-flops.  Alas, no.  What I meant was that I take more of my vacation days in the summer, when it slows down a bit at the university.    Hope the folks who sign my checks at the university understand that . . .

Speaking of that, it’s been interesting slowly losing my anonymity as a writer.  I’d gotten used to being something of a secret writer, preferring for the most part not to tell many people about my other life even as I started having some success, but the cat’s really out of the bag now.  Which is fine, I guess, it all comes with the territory as you take the next step up the publishing ladder, but it is something I’ve had to come to terms with.

Many of you have probably already heard about this through other channels (isn’t everyone on Facebook these days?), but in case you haven’t, I have big news to share:  I sold my second book!

It’s called WOODEN BONES, and though I sold it to the same imprint as my first book (Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers), it’s a very different kind of story.  This one’s a fantasy aimed at middle grade readers, and the tag line is, “Becoming a Real Boy Was Just the Beginning . . .”

If you guessed that it’s the untold story of Pinocchio, with a dark twist, then you’re on the right track.  The twist is that Pino, as he’s come to be known after he became a real boy, has discovered that he has the power to bring puppets to life himself — and what happens to him because of this newfound ability.  Since the original story by Carlo Collodi is in the public domain, this gave me creative license to take that story and imagine what might have come later — giving myself free rein to go where the story took me and not be constrained by the original tale.  Rather than an homage to the original story, think of this as taking something firmly rooted in the public consciousness and giving it a twist.  It was a blast to write, a story full of adventure and heartbreak, so I’m hoping that comes across for the reader.

As to when it’ll be available, that’s yet to be determined, but hopefully it won’t be two and half years like my first book.  I created a little logo because I plan to do something fun with this book:  I’m going to do a little more “behind the scenes” posts as this book winds its way toward publication.  A lot of people don’t know all that goes into a book that sells to a major publisher — from coming up with the idea to seeing it in a bookstore — so I thought I’d use this book as a means to shed some light on the process.  Stay tuned.