Archives
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 |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, October 1st, 2008 under 1930s NYC novel, Food, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, September 29th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA, Travelling, What's your fairy?, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 0:16, September 28th, 2008 under Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy |
The New York Liberty
won the first game of the Eastern Conference Finals. It was an ugly win. An ugly game. The only grace notes were Deanna Nolan's gorgeous shooting---I swear she stays up in the air for seconds at a time, she looks great even when she misses---the great turnout, and the fact that we won.
I didn't think it was possible for me to hate Bill Laimbeer more than I do. But his performance tonight pushed my hate a few notches upward. How he managed not to get a delay of game call or a technical I will never understand. Sit down, Bill!
Later today I will be in Larchmont, which is a mere twenty minutes from Grand Central:
Saturday, ...
Posted by Justine at 0:27, September 27th, 2008 under Basketball, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sport |
Beef jerky is good.
A lint brush is essential.
A publicist with a sense of humour and a better memory than anyone alive is vastly excellent indeed.
Publicists are all convinced that authors have the worst memories ever. I suspect they are right.
I know that some writers get heaps of work done while on tour but I am most definitely not one of them.
Q & A is always the best part of an appearance. Though I already knew that.
No one wants to hear an author read. Boring!
If you must be stuck in a dread car for ages it's best to have witty, entertaining company and be in a convertible.
School visits are best when the ...
Posted by Justine at 0:02, September 25th, 2008 under Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 0:05, September 24th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, What's your fairy?, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 12:40, September 23rd, 2008 under Basketball, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, New York City/USA, Praising, Sport, Writing goals & milestones, Young Adult literature |
Because you deserve it, some more YA author fairies for your delectation:
Penni Russon, author of the wondrous Undine trilogy, has a most useful fairy:
I have a voice recognition fairy - with her help I can always pick out celebrity voices in animations. As you might imagine this is a very useful skill and has served me well on numerous occasions.
I wish I had a zen master fairy to help with the parenting of the children.
Lauren Myracle, author of the amazing and terrifying Bliss, had this to say when I asked her what her fairy is:
My Starbucks fairy simply loves Starbucks and steers me toward one EVERY DAY, regardless of any opinion *I* might have on the ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, September 22nd, 2008 under Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, What's your fairy? |
Posted by Justine at 15:39, September 21st, 2008 under Cons & Other Gatherings, Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Reading, Young Adult literature |
I have never published a photo of a cat on my blog before. This is because I believe it is a cheap way to gain visitors to your blog. I have vowed never to stoop so low.
However, I recently stopped in at
Borderlands Books to say hi to Jude and sign stock. A visit to Borderlands also means hanging out with Ripley the store cat.
Ripley is the weirdest looking cat I have ever seen. She's a
Sphynx, who are hairless space aliens. Ripley was recovering from surgery and attired in an old t-shirt to protect her stitches. This made her somewhat grumpy. As it would.
Fortunately there is now a second Borderlands cat, Ash, who deigned ...
Posted by Justine at 16:59, September 20th, 2008 under Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Posted by Justine at 14:42, September 19th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Scott here, guest-blogging from the West Coast Tour Command Center (aka Room 401). Justine is out talking to kids at schools, so I'm holding down the fort (aka ordering room service). This is just a reminder that Justine has a gig at Not Your Mother's Book Club tonight (aka Thursday, Sep 18).
The store is Books Inc.
The address is 601 Van Ness.
The city is San Francisco.
The time: 7PM.
We hope to see you there!
And just because I'm briefly in control of Justine's blog: it's 'color,' not 'colour.' That's because we save our u's for this:
U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!
(I'm in so much trouble. Heh.)
Posted by Justine at 14:30, September 18th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Because they have signs like this at the entrance to their school libraries:
Isn't that absolutely wonderful? Made me so happy!
Yesterday I got many texts telling me that How To Ditch Your Fairy had been
boingled. Thank you, Cory! And
Whatever'd. Thank you, Scalzi! And
Slayground'd! Thank you, Little Willow! I also learned that HTDYF is on the
Lone Star list. Since Texas is my favourite state in the union ((Other than all the other ones I love.)) that pretty much made my day too.
To quickly answers some questions: The tour is going fabulously. I'm having the time of my life. I heart all the bookshops I've been ...
Posted by Justine at 10:33, September 17th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Today is the official publication day of How To Ditch Your Fairy in North America. To celebrate I am doing
what I did for Magic's Child: sharing the first sentence of each chapter of HTDYF.
As usual my concern is to protect you, the potential reader of the novel, from unnecessary spoilerage. Because there is nothing worse. NOTHING. Hence there is a small amount of redaction. Trust me, it is for your own good.
Without further ado, behold the How To Ditch Your Fairy first sentences:
1. My [redacted] looked funny in the [redacted], which is odd because my [redacted] are tiny. ((You'll have to read the book to find out what [redacteds] are. Although I worry that it is only ...
Posted by Justine at 12:00, September 16th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Writing goals & milestones |
A while back I asked my faithful blog readers
what their fairy is or what fairy they wanted. Twas a popular post so in honour of the imminent publication of my latest book,
How To Ditch Your Fairy, set in a world where almost everyone has a personal fairy, I asked these questions of a tonne of writers. I'll be sharing their answers with you over the next few months.
Here's what
John Green, multiple-award winning author and all-round good guy, had to say:
The fairy I most wish I had at the moment is the Dog Whisperer fairy, because then I would understand why Willy just peed inside.
I seem to have something of a Spare Change fairy. I ...
Posted by Justine at 22:04, September 15th, 2008 under Bloggery, Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, What's your fairy? |
My
imminent tour---I get on a plane to California in a matter of hours---has left me contemplating the one bad thing about book tours: junk food. Sometimes while going from school visit to book shop appearance there's little time for eating and the options available are limited to substances I would rather not eat. ((How do I know this? From accompanying Scott on his tour and from hearing tales of other people's tours.)) I does not like the junk food.
I have nothing against anyone else consuming it, but me, I does not want to. My lack of junk food love never used to be a problem back home. But here in the US many people are personally insulted by ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, September 14th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, Food, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Whingeing |
Just to let you all know that the mighty
How To Ditch Your Fairy Tour begins on Monday in Northern California. For all those complaining that I'm not going to Southern California:
it's not up to me, it's down to demand and my publicist.
The tour page is constantly being updated with correct addresses and times and extra events. Today I added a couple of in-store stock signings as well as the address and time for the Schuler's event in Walker, Michigan.
What is an in-store stock signing you ask? It means I'll be stopping in at a book shop and signing but I won't be reading, or doing Q&A, or juggling, or anything fancy. But if you're ...
Posted by Justine at 0:01, September 13th, 2008 under Bloggery, Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
I was chatting with my trusted partener in time wasting friend,
Mr Scalzi, in a fairly desultory manner when we made the startling discovery that both of us hates signing books with a Sharpie. And yet that is what we most often are given when we do signings.
What gives?
Sharpies bleed all over the page and their line is way too thick. They're pretty much useless for signing books. Great for graffiting toilets and making posters but for book signing? Hopeless!
Why do we keep being given them to sign with? Anyone know? Care to venture a theory?
Are there writers who actually like signing with Sharpies?
For those wondering we both deal with the problem by bringing our own trusted signing pens. ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, September 10th, 2008 under Book tour, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Whingeing |
Starting on Monday 15 September I will be
roaming around the US of A teaching people how to get rid of fairies that annoy them. It's a tough job but someone has to do it.
Next week will be all northern California, then there'll be a bit of a break with stops in Philadelphia and New York, before I set out for Michigan, Ohio, and Missouri. Then in November there will be some Texas appearances. That's right, my tour covers seven different states. Not bad, eh? Full details can be found
here. Complaints about my not going to your town or your state should be sent to my publicist. You can find her
address here.
This is my very ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, September 8th, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, New York City/USA |
Lately, I've been receiving a slew of lovely fan letters mostly about HTDYF but also about the trilogy. More than I've ever received before. Thank you so much.
I'm really sorry I haven't replied yet. Right now there are more than three thousand emails in my inbox. And lots and lots and lots of other more pressing matters---you know, the kind that pay bills---have to be dealt with before I can get to the non-urgent email. Please forgive me.
Obviously I'm not very good at managing my time, but I'm working on it. I will get to your letters I just don't know when. Please bear with me.
In the meantime, I remain committed to blogging every day. So if all else fails ...
Posted by Justine at 0:39, September 5th, 2008 under Excuses, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy |
Posted by Justine at 21:20, September 2nd, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Publishing business |
Posted by Justine at 13:55, September 2nd, 2008 under Book tour, Cons & Other Gatherings, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Writing goals & milestones |
I'm lying awake with a nasty case of bunker brain. Sleep eludes and weird thoughts intrude. I'm trying to combat them by
a) planning some fun ways to promote How To Ditch Your Fairy---so far the winning plan is to glue copies of the book to the backs of toilet doors---and,
b) trying to figure out how to describe the smell of flying foxes without using the words "musk" or "feral".
Also I'm wishing I could draw.
How about you?
Posted by Justine at 4:37, August 29th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sydney/Australia, Toilets, Travelling |
Posted by Justine at 18:05, August 27th, 2008 under Admin, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy |
Posted by Justine at 19:29, August 17th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Several people are asking when
How To Ditch Your Fairy will be available for purchase. You have a mere four weeks to wait! The release date for the USA and Canada is 16 September 2008. I don't have a release date for the German edition but will let you know as soon as I know.
The novel I just finished the zero draft of has the nickname of Liar Book. Yes, it has an actual proper name. No, I'm not telling you what that title is.
As mentioned many times previously it is the same title as a song by an all-girl band of the 1990s. You have to guess the name of the song NOT the ...
Posted by Justine at 3:50, August 16th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Posted by Justine at 16:45, July 31st, 2008 under Fans & readers, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Reading, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 20:50, July 23rd, 2008 under Admin, Bloggery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Magic or Madness trilogy, Writing goals & milestones |
I may have mentioned that
Leilani Mitchell of the
New York Liberty looks pretty much exactly how I imagined Charlie, the protag of How To Ditch Your Fairy, looking. And she's a point guard---just like Charlie! How perfect is that?
So here is a Leilani photo taken by Bruce Yeung to adorn the most recent reviews of HTDYF. ((I love this photo. How gorgeous is it that her coach, Patty Coyle, is taller than she is? Also that Leilani's so ready to get back into the game that Coyle has to hold her jersey to finish giving her the rest of the play.))
The first review is over at ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, July 19th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sport, Vainglory |
Posted by Justine at 0:03, July 10th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Ranting, Whingeing, Writing goals & milestones |
Posted by Justine at 11:51, June 30th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, June 25th, 2008 under Basketball, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sport |
Posted by Justine at 18:44, June 17th, 2008 under Bloggery, Excuses, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Publishing business |
Posted by Justine at 13:17, June 13th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Posted by Justine at 23:01, June 12th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Posted by Justine at 9:33, June 10th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Posted by Justine at 8:21, June 9th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, May 5th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Vainglory, Writing goals & milestones |
Have any of you ever taken a lie detection test of any kind? (Polygraph or written q & a or some other kind of test I have not read about yet.) If so would you care to tell me about it? Feel free to be anonymous in the comments if you'd prefer.
And more generally: for those of you who have told lies and gotten away with it---what's your method?
Do any of you believe you have the ability to tell when someone else is lying? Is it a general ability or just with people you know well?
Can any of you recommend any good non-fiction articles and books about lying? Most of what I've found so far has been deeply underwhelming.
Thanks!
And thanks ...
Posted by Justine at 11:33, February 19th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Liar, Research |
My new novel, How To Ditch Your Fairy, is set in a world where almost everyone has a personal fairy. My protag, Charlie, has a parking fairy (which she hates because she's only fourteen and doesn't drive and doesn't like cars), her best friend has a clothes-shopping fairy, and her arch enemy has an all-boys-will-like-you fairy.
So what's your fairy?
Or what fairy would you like to have?
Posted by Justine at 10:48, February 18th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, What's your fairy? |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, February 8th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Vainglory, Writing life |
Apparently, the top sekrit title of my new book is already out of the bag. And who was the wicked naughty person who let out the top sekrit ahead of the cover art showing up? What's the name of that evil party pooper?
Er, um, that would be me. In
this interview (no. 13) with Jim Hall of Cult Pop, an excellent Detroit TV show about pop culture.
So I will share with all of you as well. The title of my next book, formerly know as The Ultimate Fairy Book and before that as the Great Australian Feminist Monkey-Knife-Fighting Elvis Cricket Mangosteen novel, is:
How To Ditch Your Fairy
I think it is the best title ever and not only because google's ...
Posted by Justine at 0:39, February 7th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy |
I just typed the (top sekrit) title of my fairy novel into google and came up with ZERO hits. ZERO. No book has ever had that title before. Not only that but no one has even put those words together before. Title of my next book for the win!
I will be revealing top sekrit new title as soon as there's a cover to go with it. So if you happens to know the top sekrit title please not to give the game away. Thank you very much!
I am now determined that all future titles of my books will beat google. It could lead to much obscureness of titles. Yay!
Posted by Justine at 0:00, February 7th, 2008 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Titles & names |
Posted by Justine at 10:01, February 2nd, 2008 under Frippery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Research, Words & Language, Young Adult literature |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, January 15th, 2008 under Frippery, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Ideas, Writing life |
Posted by Justine at 0:00, December 31st, 2007 under First Kiss, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Last Day of the Year, Love is Hell, Magic or Madness trilogy, Writing goals & milestones |
Posted by Justine at 0:03, December 29th, 2007 under Admin, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Praising, Writing process |
Posted by Justine at 10:35, December 20th, 2007 under Excuses, How To Ditch Your Fairy, Writing goals & milestones |
