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This is
my annual post where I sum up what happened in my professional life in that year and look ahead to what's going to happen in 2010. Basically I do this so I can have a handy record that I can get to in seconds. (Hence the "last day of the year" tag.) Do feel free to skip it. ((Cause it will be boring. Don't say you weren't warned.))
This year, though, was less happy than any of the previous years I've summed up here. Thus my summary is brief. I want to get past 2009 and on to the fun of 2010 as fast as I can.
Books out: Liar (hc in US & tpb in Oz), HTDYF (in ...
Posted by Justine at 0:59, December 31st, 2009 under 1930s NYC novel, Bloggery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Last Day of the Year, Liar, Magic or Madness trilogy, Travelling, Unicorns, Zombies, Zombies v Unicorns |
This year I've been getting more and more people asking about ebook editions of my novels. This is my general response to that query.
First of all: you're asking the wrong person. My publishers are in charge of the electronic rights to my novels. If you're curious
John Scalzi has more to say on this question. If you're desperate for ebooks of my stuff bug my publishers, not me. That will be much more effective.
But here's what I know: Penguin has made electronic editions of Magic Lessons and Magic's Child available. But for some reason not the first book in that trilogy, Magic or Madness. Apparently they're working on it. That's all I know.
Bloomsbury, who publish How To Ditch ...
Posted by Justine at 21:02, November 13th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Magic or Madness trilogy, Publishing business, Reading, Young Adult literature |
A while ago I posted about my
writing goals. I
updated it a year ago with the publication of How To Ditch Your Fairy. But now I have published Liar which is in a whole new genre and allows me to cross even more off my lists.
My goals are not stuff like Become NYT Bestselling Author or Win Nobel Prize. Winning prizes and making bestseller lists is not something I can control, but I can control what I write. So that's what my goals are about. Simple, really.
First the genres:
Romance
Historical
Crime (what some call mysteries)
Thriller)
Fantasy
SF
Comedy
Horror
Mainstream or litfic (you know, Literature: professor has affair with much younger student in the midst of mid-life crisis)
Western
Problem novel
YA
The publication of ...
Posted by Justine at 15:28, October 17th, 2009 under 1930s NYC novel, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Writing goals & milestones |
For a while now I've been thinking about how many readers seem to hate female characters more than they hate male. Or rather that the same behaviour from a male character is okay but someone inexcusable in a female. Sarah Rees Brennan has written about this phenomenon
most eloquently:
Let us think of the Question of Harry Potter. I do not mean to bag on the character of Harry Potter: I am very fond of him.
But I think people would be less fond of him if he was Harriet Potter. If he was a girl, and she'd had a sad childhood but risen above it, and she'd found fast friends, and been naturally talented at her school's only important sport, ...
Posted by Justine at 13:50, October 15th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Magic or Madness trilogy, State of the World |
I'll be here:
Friday, 16 October, 7:00 pm:
Voracious Reader
1997 Palmer Ave
Larchmont, NY
It's a very short train ride from Grand Central so if you're in NYC and wish to hear me be witty and wise you can do so! It's even closer if you're in Westchester County and thereabouts, (which you would probably know if you were in Westchester County or thereabouts).
I'll be talking about Liar, writing and life, and answering all your questions. In fact, I have decided that this will be the event where I tell the true ending of Liar. So if you don't attend you will never know! Though I did say I would reveal all in Memphis and Nashville yet I didn't. But I'm quite sure ...
Posted by Justine at 15:11, October 14th, 2009 under Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Magic or Madness trilogy |
Yup, it's finally here. Liar is now officially out in the world in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the USA! Is it just me or did that take FOREVER?
Also available for the first time today (officially) the audio books of
Liar and
How To Ditch Your Fairy. As well as the gorgeous US paperback of How To Ditch Your Fairy which as I may have mentioned multiple times is
my favourite cover of all time. (Look to your left at the squashed fairy.)
If you can't afford to buy new books right now, but are desperate to read Liar, I recommend getting your local library to buy a copy (if they haven't already) or having a friend who ...
Posted by Justine at 12:49, September 29th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Listening |
Back in early August, Doret Canon of the wonderful blog,
The Happy Nappy Bookseller, wrote to thank me for linking to her and ”put in a request for a YA novel featuring girls playing sports. Any sport will do.” I misread her as asking for recommendations for such YA novels when she was in fact asking me to write ‘em. (What can I say August was kind of mental for me.) I was ashamed to discover that all I could think of was Catherine Murdock’s Dairy Queen series and my own How To Ditch Your Fairy. It transpired that Doret knows more about YA sports books than anyone else on the planet. We soon got to talking about books, ...
Posted by Justine at 0:30, September 22nd, 2009 under Basketball, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Young Adult literature |
I have been remiss in mentioning that the US paperback of How To Ditch Your Fairy also makes its appearance on 29 September. ((It's already available in paperback in Australia.)) That's right, finally FINALLY, the fabulous new US paperback cover will be out there in the wild, available for all who want it. ((I do know some of you prefer the US hardcover and Oz paperback version. Madness!)) I have waxed lyrical about
Danielle Delaney's design before. It truly is the best cover any book of mine has ever received. It captures the spirit of the book, it's funny, and I adore the colour scheme. Happiness in my eyes!
To celebrate the new cheaper edition of How To Ditch Your ...
Posted by Justine at 14:01, September 14th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Listening |
Enough of youse lot are wondering what's up with me not blogging every day that I am driven to offer an explanation for my blog silence of late. A brief explanation: travel, busy, knackered, bad sport karma.
I have many posts brewing or brewed. More on race, writing and publishing (here's a
few links to
others. I'm especially loving the Writers Against Racism series on
Amy Bowllan's SLJ blog like
this one with Ari of
Reading in Color.); a complaint about Being Human (Why does the woman have to be a timid ghost? Wouldn't it have been much more interesting if she was the werewolf or the vampire? Um, okay no need to write ...
Posted by Justine at 15:21, September 2nd, 2009 under Bloggery, Excuses, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar |
In addition to my
Melbourne Writers Festival events---first one is
tomorrow with Scott and Isobelle Carmody *squee*---soon I'll be off on my second US tour. Pretty, exciting, eh?
I just added a few events to the
appearances page. So far I have events confirmed (or close to) for Phoenix,
Nashville, Memphis,
Austin, Seattle, Portland and New York City. I'm especially excited about those first three cities as I've never been to any of them before.
Also: Memphis = Gracelands = Justine hyperventilating. For those of who don't know, yes, I am a daggy Elvis fan. Goes back to
when I was very little.
There will be at least one or two more cities on my tour. ...
Posted by Justine at 21:58, August 21st, 2009 under Book tour, First Kiss, Frippery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, New York City/USA |
Next week I'll be doing four events at the
Melbourne Writers Festival. None of my events are free, alas. Sorry about that! I will work extra hard on these panels to make up for it. ((Not that I don't give my all for free events!))
My Sunday event is part of the adults programming and thus is
a bit pricey. You can
book your ticket here. However, my other events are part of the under 18 programming and thus are only $6. You can
book the U-18 events here.
Event 1
Day: Sunday
Date: 23/08/2009
Time: 4:00 PM
Venue: ACMI 1
Event Name:
Taking Over the Grown-Ups Table
Panelists: Isobelle Carmody, Scott Westerfeld, Justine Larbalestier
Chair: Agnes Nieuwenhuizen
Official Description: Join Justine Larbalestier, ...
Posted by Justine at 18:18, August 18th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy, Sydney/Australia |
Posted by Justine at 14:45, June 14th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Ideas, Liar, Vainglory, Writing life, Writing process |
Update with warning: Do not post spam here about your boy-friendly book. I am
deleting all such comments.
One of the most gratifying aspects of meeting people who've read How To Ditch Your Fairy since it came out last September (in the USA) is the number of boys who've turned out to be fans of the book. I will admit that given the title and the cover I was expecting an almost non-existent boy readership. I've been told a million times that boys won't touch a pink book and that HTDYF is irredeemably pink. So I've been dead chuffed by the boy fans.
While on tour for the book last year many parents asked me if they thought my book would ...
Posted by Justine at 8:11, June 5th, 2009 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Reading |
Posted by Justine at 14:55, May 23rd, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Magic or Madness trilogy, Scott's books, Vainglory |
My blog has no copy editor, no proof reader, and no fact checker. It's just me. Occasionally I'll get Scott or one of my friends to proof a post, but not often. They're busy. Even more rarely my readers will point out errors. Yesterday someone wrote and told me I'd misspelt Count Basie's name on my bio page. *Blushes*. I was extremely grateful. That mistake had already been there close to a year! Who knows how many more such errors there are all over this blog?
I'm not
a great speller and I find proper nouns especially difficult. The copy editors on my last two books, How To Ditch Your Fairy and Liar, found I'd spelled various of the characters ...
Posted by Justine at 18:03, May 15th, 2009 under Bloggery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar |
Posted by Justine at 0:23, May 9th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, What's your fairy? |
I am extremely happy to let youse all know that I just said yes to a joint offer from
Bolinda in Australia and
Brilliance Audio in the USA to produce audio versions of How To Ditch Your Fairy and Liar.
This makes me especially happy as it guarantees an Australian actor will read How To Ditch Your Fairy. Yay! It will sound the way it's supposed to and not like Dick Van Dyke doing a cockney accent in Mary Poppins. ((Yes, I might possibly be referring to the audio version of the Magic or Madness trilogy. I might even be implying that it's unspeakably bad. Maybe.))
Will let you know as soon as I hear when the release dates will ...
Posted by Justine at 0:02, April 7th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 0:05, March 30th, 2009 under Bloggery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy, New York City/USA, Publishing business, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 1:47, March 17th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Magic or Madness trilogy, Publishing business, Ranting, Writing process |
Posted by Justine at 2:01, March 4th, 2009 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sydney/Australia |
Posted by Justine at 4:20, March 1st, 2009 under Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Travelling |
Posted by Justine at 6:54, February 24th, 2009 under Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Publishing business, Sydney/Australia, Travelling |
Posted by Justine at 2:45, February 22nd, 2009 under Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
Did I mention that I have a new How To Ditch Your Fairy cover for the US paperback?
Behold:
Posted by Justine at 16:15, February 19th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising |
Posted by Justine at 16:21, January 30th, 2009 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy, Writing process |
How To Ditch Your Fairy will be published in its shiny new paperback Australian edition next month.
So. Very. Soon.
If you go over to the Allen & Unwin Alien Onion blog
you'll see what it looks like.
And guess what? I'll be doing a wee bit of a mini Oz book tour. I'm dead excited.
Two of my events are in Melbourne, including the actual book launch:
22 Feb 2009, 2:00PM - 3:30PM
Me and Simmone Howell in conversation + cake
State Library of Victoria - Conference Centre
328 Swanston Street
(Entrance 3 on La Trobe Street)
Melbourne, Victoria
Go here to book
24 Feb 2009, 6:30PM
Australian launch of How To Ditch Your Fairy
My book will be introduced by the lovely
Lili Wilkinson!
Readings Carlton
309 ...
Posted by Justine at 1:43, January 21st, 2009 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sydney/Australia |
Yup, it's my annual what-I-did-this-year skiting post. I write these mostly for myself so I can easily keep track. Hence the
last day of the year category. Thus you are absolutely free to skip it. ((I would if I were you.))
This year was exceptional. I'm still pinching myself. My first Bloomsbury USA book, How To Ditch Your Fairy, was published and seems to be doing well. I was sent on my first book tour, which was fabulous. It's insane how much fun I had and how many fabulous schools, book shops and libraries I visited in California, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas. Thank you to everyone who came to see me while I was on the ...
Posted by Justine at 0:20, December 31st, 2008 under 1930s NYC novel, Book tour, First Kiss, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Last Day of the Year, Love is Hell, New York City/USA, Sport, State of the World, Sydney/Australia, Vainglory, Writing goals & milestones, Writing life, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 6:13, December 27th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, What's your fairy? |
Posted by Justine at 5:19, December 26th, 2008 under 1930s NYC novel, Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy, Mangosteens, Praising, Reading, Sport, Young Adult literature |
One of the conversations that I have most frequently with my good friend,
Diana Peterfreund, is about our different writing methods. She's an outliner; I wing it.
Tis most excellent fun talking writing with her precisely because we could not be more different. So different that we frequently wind up talking at cross purposes. Last time we had this discussion we got hung up on the phrase "first draft". Turns out that what she means by "first draft" is not what I mean.
Because Diana outlines she figures out much of the novel before she begins writing. I figure things out as I write the first draft. Thus my first drafts---zero drafts really---are frequently messy conversation spines. A large part of ...
Posted by Justine at 2:52, December 17th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Words & Language, Writing process, Young Adult literature |
I've had a few folks write to me to ask where they can buy signed copies of my books. The answer is there are many many places. I was just on tour, see, and wherever I went I signed books. Even if you have zero interest in whether a book is signed or not these are all very fine bookshops that you should check out if you haven't already:
California:
Borderlands Books
866 Valencia St.
San Francisco CA 94110
Bonus: they have two gorgeous
Sphynx cats.
Kepler’s
1010 El Camino Real
Menlo Park, CA
The Storyteller
30 Lafayette Cir
Lafayette, CA
Copperfield’s Books
140 Kentucky St
Petaluma, CA
Books Inc.
601 Van Ness
San Francisco, CA
Michigan
Schuler Books & Music
3165 Alpine Ave
Walker, MI
Pooh’s Corner
Breton Village
1886 1/2 Breton Rd. S.E.
Grand ...
Posted by Justine at 9:05, November 30th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Vainglory |
Posted by Justine at 10:58, November 28th, 2008 under Bloggery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Vainglory |
Posted by Justine at 13:20, November 21st, 2008 under 1930s NYC novel, Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, New York City/USA, Scott's books, Writing process, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 16:05, November 20th, 2008 under Book tour, Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA, Publishing business, Scott's books |
So we made it in one piece to sunny, warm Texas. Wow. The weather is so much better here than it was in NYC. Yay that we're here and not there.
You can catch me and Scott at BookPeople tonight and then you can see me do my thing in San Antonio tomorrow night:
Wednesday, 19 November 2008, 7:30PM
With Scott Westerfeld
BookPeople
603 N. Lamar
Austin, Texas
Thursday, 20 November 2008, 7:00PM
Barnes & Noble
Northwoods Shopping Center
18030 Highway 281 North
San Antonio, Texas
Hope to see some of you there!
Posted by Justine at 12:42, November 19th, 2008 under Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 9:40, November 14th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Love is Hell, New York City/USA, Reading, Sport, State of the World, Sydney/Australia, What's your fairy? |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, November 11th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA, Unicorns, Young Adult literature, Zombies |
This made my day:
Get it? E. Kristin Anderson, who works at the fabulous
Book People in Austin, is a
parking fairy. Just like the one Charlie has in How To Ditch Your Fairy. Only, you know, not invisible. Isn't that superb?
Coincidently, me and Scott will be hanging out at
Book People on
19 November at 7:30PM. Can't wait!
Happy Halloween!
Posted by Justine at 20:41, October 31st, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA, Travelling |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, October 29th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Travelling |
Posted by Justine at 11:54, October 27th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sport, What's your fairy? |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, October 24th, 2008 under Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA, Travelling, Vainglory, Young Adult literature |
I have neglected to let all you fabulous Canadians know that I will be in Canada next week. Toronto to be precise and, yes, there will be an appearance. Me and Scott will be here next Monday:
Monday, 27 October, 7:00PM-8:00PM
Indigo Bookstore
Yorkdale Mall
3401 Dufferin Street
Toronto, Ontario
Here's hoping some of my Torontonian readers will be there. I promise to tell really gross vomit stories. Or, you know, not, if that grosses you out.
They're really great vomit stories, but.
Posted by Justine at 0:21, October 20th, 2008 under Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Travelling |
Allen & Unwin, my Australian publisher, has a blog:
Alien Onion. (See if you can figure out why it is thus named.) And they has written a post
welcoming me. I is dead chuffed. Thank 'ee!
There's also a
preview of the Oz cover of How To Ditch Your Fairy. See if you can spot what's different to the US cover.
Do check out the rest of
their blog it's the most lively fun publisher's blog I've seen. With lots of excellent guests and pictures of cake. I think it will give you an inkling of why I am so ecstatic that Allen & Unwin is my new Australian home.
Posted by Justine at 10:49, October 18th, 2008 under Bloggery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Sydney/Australia |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, October 15th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Many of you have been asking, "When is How To Ditch Your Fairy going to be published in Australia?" I apologise for not answering. For ages I did not know if it would be or not and then it sold and I was not allowed to tell you. But now I can!
How To Ditch Your Fairy will be published in Australia in late February by the fabulous
Allen & Unwin. That's right I am now published by the same house that publishes Ursula Dubosarsky, Margo Lanagan, Garth Nix, Penni Russon and Lili Wilkinson amongst many other fabulously wonderful Oz YA writers.
What's more A&U are not only publishing HTDYF, they're publishing the liar book too!
Keeping this news to myself has ...
Posted by Justine at 15:46, October 14th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sydney/Australia, Vainglory |
Posted by Justine at 18:46, October 9th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 9:25, October 8th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, October 5th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 14:08, October 3rd, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA, Praising, Viewing, Whingeing |
Posted by Justine at 23:21, October 2nd, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
