Dear all,
The fine folks at Pocket Star have arranged a fantastic cover reveal event for Attack the Geek across a number of great blogs and sites. I’ve rounded up the links here so you can partake of the dicebag full of excitement!
Links a go-go:
Adventures in Sci-Fi Publishing
And for archival purposes, now that you all have visited those lovely sites, here it is:
Dear all,
I’ll be attending FOGcon in the Bay Area of California this weekend (March 7-9th), along with other authors, fans, and members of the community. The Honored Guests are Seanan McGuire, Tim Powers, who are both powerhouse writers and pillars of the community. The Honored Ghost is James Tiptree, Jr. (aka Alice Sheldon), who was one of my favorite writers of feminist SF.
In addition to reuniting with my beloved college and post-college writing group, I’m going to be on paneling and hope to meet some readers and members of the local SF/F community.
Here’s my schedule:
| Networking 101 for Writers | participant | Sat, 9:00–10:15 am | Salon A/B | ||
| Secrets of the Writing World | participant | Sat, 1:30–2:45 pm | Sacramento | ||
| Reading: Brennan, Helms, Underwood | participant | Sat, 4:30–5:45 pm | Santa Rosa |
I’m particularly excited about the reading, as the three of us (Marie Brennan, Alyc Helms, and myself) are all member of the aforementioned writers’ group. These folks helped me get my start, and it’s great for us to all now be on programming together as colleagues.
If you see me at the con, please come up and say hello! Meeting new people is one of my favorite parts of conventions.
Engage Shameless Self-promo!
Calling all Geekomancers!
Attack the Geek: A Ree Reyes Side-Quest is now available for request on NetGalley – this is a novella in the Ree Reyes series (Geekomancy, Celebromancy), and is about 1/2 the size of a normal novel in the series. It has the same whacky energy and snappy comedy you’ve come to expect from the Ree Reyes series, with 100% more jokes about Jumanji and classic strategy games.
I hope you’ll check it out, or read when the novella releases on April 7th!
/Shameless Self-Promo
#SFWApro
I’m incredibly pleased to say that audio rights to Attack the Geek, the forthcoming Ree Reyes novella have sold to Audible!
From Publishers Marketplace:
Audio rights
Michael Underwood’s ATTACK THE GEEK, a side quest novella starring his bestselling heroine Ree Reyes, to Lee Jarit at Audible, in a nice deal, by Sara Megibow of Nelson Literary Agency.
This means we’ll get to continue the Ree Reyes series in audio format, which makes me tremendously happy. I hope we’ll have the audio version out close to the release of the ebook, but that remains to be seen. More about this audio edition when I have it!
I come from musical people. Not just Musical People (Broadway, etc.), but music people. My parents met doing musical theater, my little sister is likely to study Vocal Performance/Musical Theater at college, I’ve performed in musicals and spent more than ten year in various choirs.
Even though I’m five years out from my last music gig, music still has an incredible impact on me. Even being a writer, music is still the form most likely to get me from emotionally neutral to teary in 60 seconds flat.
I’ve talked before about the fact that I write to music. In fact, music is so integrated into my process that I seldom really feel like I have my head wrapped around a story concept until I’ve settled on at least a small handful of songs that take me to the right mental/emotional headspace.
Here’s some music that’s gotten me moving and kept me writing in the last few months:
Postmodern Jukebox “Die Young”
Daft Punk ft. Farrell Williams “Get Lucky”
Amy McNally Hazardous Fiddle
Grace Potter & The Nocturnals “Stars”
Two Steps From Hell Archangel
Hi all. Because I have a zillion projects that I’m juggling right now, I’m late on the Eligibility Round-Ups for 2013 work.
Eligibility
I only published one fiction work in 2013 — CELEBROMANCY, the second in my Ree Reyes urban fantasy series. It is a 2nd in series, but it was written to be accessible to new readers and a stand-alone for folks who don’t like series. It’s available in ebook and the audiobook is performed marvelously by Mary Robinette Kowal.
Mary’s performance of CELEBROMANCY is eligible for Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form, due to the current interpretation of how audiobooks are handled for eligibility. I’d strongly encourage people to consider their favorite audiobook performances of 2013 when drawing up your Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form ballots.
I suppose I am also eligible for the World Fantasy — Special Award: Professional for my work as the Sales & Marketing Manager for Angry Robot Books. But in reality, that award should go to someone making more of an impact on the field. I’m still warming up at Angry Robot — my best is yet to come.
My other award-nominable activity is on the fannish side. I am a contributor to the Skiffy & Fanty blog, which is eligible as best Fanzine. I am also an occasional co-host on the Skiffy & Fanty Show, which is eligible for best Fancast.
And my proudest S&F achievement for 2013, if by proud I mean delighted because it was so much fun, is the Skiffy & Fanty Show Torture Cinema episode on Sharknado. Recording that episode included far more laughing and hilarity than the Daily Recommended Dose, and was really what cemented my friendship with Shaun Duke, Jen Zink, and Julia Rios, who I would go on to join in Skiffy & Fanty hostitude. That episode, taken on its own, would be eligible for Best Dramatic Presentation: Long Form. And wouldn’t it be cool to have something not a movie win the Hugo? Super cool. I won’t shill hard for my novel, but I will shill for that podcast episode. It was super-cool.
Recommendations
This news story via TruthOut caught my interest:
The article mentions Writeahouse, which I’ve blogged about before.
This overall strategy is intriguing, and not just as a part of the creative class this approach is intending to support/use to drive economic growth.
When the details of the PPACA started to become clear, I got a big dose of hope — more support for the arts means more artists living off their art, means fewer artists needing day jobs, means those day jobs go to other people, means the audience for art has more money to support artists.
Programs like this, acting together with the PPACA, could make some serious changes for what it means to be an artist in the USA, and in who can afford to live as a working artist. The easier it is for anyone to make a living as an artist, the more working artists we’ll see, and especially more artists from diverse backgrounds, rather than just artists who have inherited money or have an economic support system to allow them to work without making as much money.
The Thode Island plan is still in proposal stages, and it’s early to see how well facets of the PPACA (Medicare expansion, state exchanges, and plan rebates) will all work in execution, but I’m choosing hope for the moment.
Hello, world! I try not to do *too* much blatant self-promo, but this is one of those times where I will indulge.
I’m over the moon to share the news that CELEBROMANCY has been selected as a Kindle Daily Deal in SF/F today. And on top of that, if you buy or have bought the ebook, the audiobook narrated (awesomely) by Mary Robinette Kowal is *also* discounted to $1.99. They have Whispersync, so you can jump back and forth seamlessly between the ebook and audiobook.
GEEKOMANCY is still a Kindle Big Deal at $1.99, so you can get both novels for only $4! That’s less than a latte, and way geekier.
I’d love your help in signal-boosting to get the word out. There’s never been a better (or more affordable) time to get in on the Ree Reyes series.
Last month, I had the honor of being a guest interviewer over at the excellent Speculate! The Podcast for Writers, Readers, and Fans, talking with Gregory A. Wilson, author of The Third Sign and the forthcoming Icarus.
Greg is normally a host on the show, but he and Brad have done a two-part series where they, the hosts, take a turn in the interviewee seat. It was a great time, and I’m really happy to have been able to help shed some light on Greg’s project Icarus, which is being made into a graphic novel with comics artist Matt Slay.
Greg and I had talked a bit before about Icarus, and I’m really pleased to see him bringing his vision for the story to life in graphic novel form.
You can listen to the interview here:
And here’s a link to the Kickstarter! It’s reached its initial goal, and now looking at very cool stretch goals.