Hi there everyone!
I’ve done a rather random vlog regarding genre, especially that of literary v. popular genres of fiction. I also give you some of my rare, but always gem-like, advice. It’s just so faceted! Really!
On Thursday I’ll have MUCH PIMPAGE and maybe another contest. We’ll see. In the meantime, tell me what you think about why we can’t all love all books, and remember there’s a contest to win a signed copy of Sophie Littlefield’s AFTERTIME on the post below this one.
See y’all soon!
Sophie Littlefield has quickly become one of my all time favorite people. I was lucky enough to meet Sophie, Juliet Blackwell, and Rachael Herron almost a year ago, at Romantic Times. Basically, we ran into each other a few times drinking (as one does, at Romantic Times), and they said, “You are are ours now, Nicole.” I’ve never been so happy to be claimed.
Sophie is brilliant, outrageously talented, and hilariously funny. Her Bad Day crime books are gritty and riveting, and she recently came out with a YA novel, Banished. Now, however, she’s coming home to mama with the release of her own urban fantasy novel, Aftertime.
So let’s welcome Sophie to the Emporium! Here’s her guest post, and she’s been generous enough to offer a contest, the details of which I’ll post at the end.
Welcome Sophie!
Sophie’s Post
I was at Target today with my daughter, waiting in line to pay and listening to her describe the essay she is writing for her English class titled “The Use of Metaphor in Ayn Rand’s ANTHEM”, when I received two emails in a row. **
The first was from Nicole, inviting me to be a guest on this blog (yay!)
The other was from my friend Meredith Barnes, a fantastic young agent I’ve gotten to know in the last year or so. I’d been whining to Meredith that I didn’t feel very inspired lately, so she wrote me back a list of words meant to inspire me (“you might use these as metaphors in the pithy posts you’re about to write” she suggested). The list included: Onion, Horse, Gastrointestinal Tract, Fate, and Shopping. ***
So here, without further ado, courtesy of Nicole and inspired by Meridith – “Metaphor in AFTERTIME.”
Onion – In the book AFTERTIME, most of the nation’s crops and plant species have been wiped out by bioterrorism. The failing government seeded the land with an engineered plant called kaysev, which provides full-spectrum nutrition and keeps people alive – but an all-kaysev leaves people hungry for variety. When, after several months, plants from Before (including the humble yellow onion) begin to return, they are met with great joy as a symbol of rebirth. (Incidentally, the second book in the series is titled REBIRTH and will be out in August ’11.)
Horse – Interestingly, I don’t care for horses. Horses and chickens. I grew up rural so I can tell you with authority that these are not smart creatures. Give me a pig, a goat, a dog any day, but horses – no thanks! One of the cool things about writing fiction is that you can make the world WHATEVER YOU WANT. Ergo, in the fictional world of AFTERTIME, there are no horses.
Only…as often goes with my kneejerk reactions, I started to feel a little guilty about my rigid stance. My kids like horses. Horses are pretty. It’s entirely possible my attitude about horses goes back to a certain unfortunate episode involving a pony ride in 1974. So…when I started the third book in the series (HORIZON! Out in March ’12! Look at me, doing promo!) I put in a horse, as a sort of nod to my own hypocrisy.
In this case, the horse bears a rider with news from the east. That’s plenty evocative of legend, right?
Gastrointestinal Tract – So when you’re living in a zombie-ridden post-apocalyptic world, medical care is hard to come by. When I sat around imagining this world, I kept thinking about all the ways that modern medicine has improved our lives. My daughter’s burst appendix and a blood clotting episode would have been mortal without it. My husband’s kidney stones would have literally killed him.
In the third book, I’ve introduced a character with an unknown but worsening malady that affects her stomach and appetite. Because there are few doctors, no equipment, and little medicine, all she can do is wait and see what happens to her. So her gastro tract has become a symbol for the greater unknown, which leads us to…
Fate – I have some fun with religion in the series, if you can call evil cults and power-abusing priestesses and ever-present crises of faith “fun”. The truth is that I was playing a lot with ideas about destiny and how we, mere humans, can choose our own. Fate and faith are, for me, irrevocably intertwined. (Blah blah blah – I do go on so.) So what symbolizes the Hand of God in the books? Perhaps a little giant sequoia seedling that Cass and her lover stumble on early in AFTERTIME – it’s vulnerable, and yet inevitable.
And finally…
Shopping – After civilization falls and Beaters start eating people, there’s no money, no banks, no stores, no commerce. And yet, the human spirit is unquenchable, so before long, commerce renews itself in various forms. In the Box – a walled city where Cass takes refuge – you can trade valuables (nonperishable food, water, medicine, clothing) for drugs, alcohol, sex and more. A form of shopping, yes? – so I suppose that shopping represents the immutability of human behavior: you can give folks kaysev, shelter, even love, but at the end of the day, they’re still going to want to make a deal.
**My daughter wants me to point out that if she actually called an essay “The Use of Metaphor in Ayn Rand’s ANTHEM” she would get docked for a lack of originality. The essay in question was eventually titled “The Middle Ground: An Achievable Utopian Society.” I stand corrected!
*** I sure hope I’m not giving out FinePrint Literary Agency trade secrets! Oh wait – if you do want to know their trade secrets, look no further!
Thank you so much to Nicole for inviting me, and join the discussion if you’d like your own copy of AFTERTIME – signed by the author!
Thank YOU so much, Sophie! To win an autographed copy of Aftertime, I want you guys to come up with your own “original title” for an imaginary essay of your choice. For example: “Nomming Towards Destiny: Images of Eating in Tempest Rising” or “A Pretty Day For Female Empowerment: How Sophie Littlefield Imagines the Feminine Capacity for Violence.”
Don’t worry, the essay title is just to enter and to make me giggle, so they can be as silly or ridiculous as you want to make them. I’ll pick the winner, at random, next Friday, March 4th.
And if you haven’t read Sophie’s books, believe me–you are missing out! I couldn’t put down her Bad Day series, and I’m so excited for Aftertime! Yay Sophie!
I’m lucky. I really enjoy my job(s). I love teaching because I get to interact with students, work with literature, and I love the performance aspect of the job.
But what is it about the writing that I love so much?
To be honest, a lot about writing can be frustrating. There’s the fact that, comparatively, I spend less time writing than I do with other writer-related things. Indeed, the raw-act-of-creation-type-writing is about one tenth of the job. The rest of it is outlining, pre-writing, rewriting, revising, editing, proofing, copyediting, writing back copy, promoting, et cetera. These things aren’t entirely frustrating, and oftentimes they lend themselves to their own types of pleasure. But the fact remains that writers actually write comparatively little when set against everything else they have to do in order to be published.
The way I get through the minor frustrations is how most people cope: I focus on the joys. The fact is, that one-tenth of the time I get to create-write is such a pleasure. I love sitting down and thinking up new scenarios that will shed light onto character’s hitherto unacknowledged darknesses. I love dreaming up conversations in which characters say all the things I wish I could say. But even better is when I go back and ruffle those conversations up, to make them more realistic and less of a fantasy. In doing so, I get that initial chance to be stunningly articulate, while later acknowledging and accepting the limitations that make up reality, at least as it is perceived by me.
Oftentimes, I admit, I work through things that are bothering me, touch upon memories that are either precious or that hurt, or I imagine things that I would like, one day, to happen. Of course, I then have to make these experiences and fantasies not-mine; I have to make them into Jane’s, or Iris’s, or Grizelda’s. In doing so, I can often play devil’s advocate to my own perceived ambitions or desires. I can work through, imaginatively, what it would be like to get what I wanted. Oftentimes, I discover that what glitters is actually dusted with those crappy sparkles that stick to everything, and never wash out of my hair.
I also get to “read” my characters, to a certain extent, as I imagine my readers do. Sometimes I want Jane to do one thing. Halfway through the scene, however, I realize Jane would never do what I want her to do, she’d do what Jane wants to do. That was absolutely the way book three ended, for me. I had no idea you-know-who was going to do you-know-what to you-know-who. She just did it, and I was like, “Holy shit!” and she was all, “Hahahahaha! You thought you could write me, did you!”
When that happens, there is much joy. There’s also horror, as I realize I now have no idea where books five and six are going, without you-know-who in the role I thought she was playing. But mostly there’s joy. Because if a character can feel that real to me, I’m hoping she feels that real to my readers.
So that’s a few of the things I get from writing, and I do take huge pleasure in it. In fact, I’m most chuffed when I receive a note or a review that says, basically, “I like reading your work because I can tell you like writing it.” I know I’ve felt that way about certain authors I love: I can practically see their gleeful little faces all lit up with pleasure behind their writing.
Have you ever felt that way about a particular writer, as if you could feel their joy in their words?
Hello my lovelies.
I’m very, very excited to announce that book five now has a title!
TEMPEST’S FURY!
I’m picturing Jane all RAWR!
And the sky’s all FIZZLEWHIZBANG!
And Anyan’s all GRRRR…
Official plotting of the book five will begin soon, and will definitely be more in-depth than that. She says, with confidence.
In other news, Jaye Wells and I are blogging over at Babel Clash for the next two weeks. We’ve already had a week of posts, then we’ll have a recess over the weekend during which Kim Harrison will be posting some stuff, and then we’ll be back on Monday.
As for me, I’m having a quiet weekend this week, but I am getting some fun reading done. I just finished Allison Pang’s Brush of Darkness, and I really enjoyed it. It’s very funny, and I think fans of Jane True would definitely like Allison’s style. Now I’m reading Nalini Singh’s Archangel’s Consort, and I adore it. I really love Nalini’s books, and this series is fabulous. If you haven’t given her a shot, please do! Her worldbuilding is amazing, and although she’s Paranormal Romance, her books are every bit as complex as any UF out there. And soooo sexy!
So what about you? Any of y’all doing something exciting, of which I can be envious, or reading anything really good you wanna share?
Okay, so it’s really Valentine’s Day. But I’ll be spending my Valentine’s Day teaching my American Literature night class. I’m sure my students are THRILLED about that. Meanwhile, I’m fine about teaching tonight, as once again I’d be spending Valentine’s Day alone. Let’s all hear a collective “awwwww” for Dr. Peeler.
To be honest, I’m not a huge fan of Valentine’s day anyway: corporate, too busy, we should be loving ALL year, etc. But the holiday does still serve as a little lemon juice in the papercut that is my completely stalled love life. So, in return, I’m going to give it a big middle finger. Who’s with me?
The above image is actually from a doggie shirt, which you can see if you click on the heart. So even your pets can hate Valentine’s Day!
Next I’m linking you to a song. It’s my ultimate non-love love song. It’s Debauchery, which I talk about in Tempest Rising. It’s about a couple who meet on a ferry and go have very drunken sex. I adore it on a number of levels. Unfortunately, all I could find was this single link to the full, real song (which I think stops being for the full song after you listen once).
Finally, before I give you your contest weiner for Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love, I’ve got the ultimate anti-love novel ever written. If you don’t read this and immediately want to move to a cave alone somewhere, where you’ll never again have to deal with the cruelties of society . . . Well, you’re a more optimistic person than should be allowed. It’s Jean Rhys’s Good Morning, Midnight:
So if you want to have a stonking great depressing Valentine’s Day, dress your dog in that t-shirt, put on “Debauchery,” and read Rhys. You’ll want to push your love life out the window in about ten minutes. OR teach American Literature 1915 Onwards to a roomful of people who want to stab you as they’re young and fresh and deplorably un-cynical and consequently DO have significant others.
One person who I’m hoping has a slightly better Valentine’s Day because of this post is the weiner of the contest for Andrew Shaffer’s Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love. The contest can has spoken, and the weiner is BECKY LEJEUNE! Email me at iheartselkies(at)gmail(dot)com to claim your prize.
So all y’all who are in love . . . have a good Valentine’s day for the rest of us. For those of you who are alone tonight, do NOT watch Prince of Persia. I did last night, and it was terrible.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
So, I’m back to belly dancing, and it’s awesome. I’m having a great time in the classes, and I’m so happy to be dancing again. That said, the place I’m taking lessons here in Pittsburgh is very different from the place I studied in Louisiana.
The studio in Louisiana, Lotus Studios, is awesome, and it’s definitely got a distinct vibe. It’s all tribal dance, and yoga, and drum circles. You walk in and you want to paint yourself in mud and dedicate yourself to the Earth Mother.
When you walk into my new studio in Pittsburgh? You’re greeted by stripper poles.
This studio specializes in pole dancing and “floor dancing,” something I conjectured was “sexy rolling,” but has been suggested to me is lap dancing. The walls are covered in boas and corsets, and there’s a massive display of perspex stripper heels when you walk in the door. It’s hilarious.
The teacher is great, and she has nothing to do with the stripper poles. We ignore them for our classes.
And yet they call to me.
I keep grabbing hold of the poles, and swinging around . . . I imagine myself, swinging again and again, before I suddenly bust out in a full on stripper routine. In my mind, it goes something like this…………
In reality, however, my dancing probably looks a little more like this . . .
But who cares, because I’m having more fun than should be allowed. I’m also doing a great job sticking to my 2011 goals. On Wednesdays, I’ve started doing Zumba with a colleague, and I love it! I’m also bringing my gym clothes to work and walking every Tuesday and Thursday, plus at my gym on Saturday. In a few weeks I hope to amp that walk up and redo the Couch to 5K. Finally, on Fridays I’m doing yoga at a studio here in Greensburg. Which means that Saturday and Sunday I complain bitterly and to all who will listen about how I fucking hate yoga, I’m now a walking sack of lactic acid, and I want to die.
I’ll know I’ve gotten fitter when I don’t think longingly of a bullet to the brain 45 minutes into yoga. For whatever reason, it kills me more than anything else.
But it’s good for me! And to cap off my current “good for me” thrust, I’ve also joined Lose It, which is a great web site (with iPhone app) that tracks calories, etc. You can find me under my name, Nicole Peeler, if you want to add me as a friend.
So February is off to an awesomely healthy start, especially if we ignore the lashings of foie gras that ushered in January.
When I do get back to fighting trim, who knows . . . I might just give one of those poles a real shot.
Probably breaking my neck. 
Hello my pretties!
First of all, I have a very exiting announcement. After a year or so of sitting with our thumbs up our asses, we at the League of Reluctant Adults are BACK IN BUSINESS.
Go ahead and click on the above banner, and you can see the beautiful Kevin Hearne’s announcement, plus BOTH of Mark Henry’s pseudonyms dancing in leotards. RAWR. We’ll be bringing such crazy shenanigans to you every month, and we’ve welcomed new member Allison Pang:
Her book apparently involves a horny unicorn, for which I will be buying it forthwith. I can’t get enough horny unicorn jokes, people. I really can’t.
In other news, I’ve been watching Denise Townsend finish her smut. I gotta say, I dig it. She’ll also have her own website soon, where you can keep updated on her selkie shenanigans. I’ll tell you as soon as she sets it up.
Besides these announcements, I thought I’d tell you what I’ve been listening to…somewhat obsessively in the case of the first band. I’ve known about The National forever, but I never really got into them. I think I liked a harder sound, and I’m all about the lyrics but the lead singer is totally a Molly Mumbler. But how things have changed, ever since I heard this song on Sirius:
When I heard “Bloodbuzz Ohio” from their new album High Velvet suddenly all reservations were gone and I wanted to lather myself in this man’s voice. From there, it spiraled into an all-out love affair, with me downloading all the older albums and just reveling. Here’s “Slow Show” from Boxer:
I think that part of my new obsession is the fact that I can write while they’re on. They’re not super intrusive, and the have such gorgeous beats. It’s like a steady thrumming of sound that I can tune into and out of as I write.
The other new album I’ve just downloaded is White Lies, Ritual. I haven’t had a chance to really listen to it, yet, but here’s a taster:
And here are my favorite songs from their last album, To Lose My Life… First we have the optimistically named “Unfinished Business”:
And here’s my ultimate fave from that album, “To Lose My Life”:
So that’s what I have been/will be listening to. Anything fun you’ve found recently?
Hi, everyone! Today I have something a little different. Andrew Shaffer was kind enough to send me two copies of his new book, Great Philosophers who Failed at Love:
Below you’ll find my review in vlog form, along with some natterings about love, and details for a contest in which you can win a copy of Andrew’s book. Just follow the instructions, and see you in comments. 
Thanks!
I’ve been HORRIBLY neglectful of this blog this past week. I got back from the UK sick as a dog–I swear I had Ebola, but everyone says it was just a cold. Or the wages of sin. Anyway, I was frantically getting ready for the spring semester whilst trying not to cough up a lung, and it was all very miserable.
So I owe you not only a blog post (or six) but, more importantly, I must announce the CONTEST WIENERS! For there were two contests running on my site, about which you have been very, very patient.
Contest #1 was a pimpage contest, run here. The winner of this contest can pick any TWO items from the following list:
Let me shake my contest can!
The contest can has spoken! The wiener of the above contest is ………. MICHELLE RED BEAR! Email me your 2 choices, Michelle, at iheartselkies(at)gmail(dot)com, and I’ll send off your choices! Congratulations!
The second contest was blogged about here, and it has a mondo special prize pack. Here’s what the lucky wiener receives:
1 UK Edition Tempest Rising
1 UK Edition Tracking the Tempest
1 MP3 CD or 1 regular CD of Tempest Rising (your choice)
1 MP3 CD or 1 regular CD of Tempest’s Legacy (your choice)
1 $25 dollar gift card from Barnes and Noble (or equivalent monetary equivalent, on your country’s Amazon)
Once again the contest can gets a shaking!
And the wiener of the above prize pack is IZZYBELLA! Congratulations, lady! Email me your address at iheartselkies(at)gmail(dot)com and I’ll send it off.
Thanks to everyone who played along! I loved all the supportive comments, and am so happy to have had so many people come on over to my site. I hope that those of you who didn’t win can still get your hands on a copy of Jane True’s adventures.
This Friday I’ll be talking about a very fun book sent to me recently, and that discussion will also have a contest attached. So come by Friday to see what’s going!
