Author: Jonathon

I finished editing the older chapters, and now have nine fresh pages on the newest Anita book. The post book blues are getting a little better. Today was the closest to a normal mood that I’ve had since I finished SWALLOWING DARKNESS on Saturday. Still moody, still tender to the touch emotionally. Despair still nips at my heels, but it’s more like some yappy ankle biting dog. A few days back despair was more like a huge tiger that threw me to the ground and savaged me. It felt like a kind of death.

I said, "This feels worse than usual." Jon and Darla both, separately, said, "You always say that." Every emotion I’ve had, no matter how dark, they all individually confirmed, "You always do that." Hmm.

Darla says that it’s like baby amnesia. You forget how awful it is to be pregnant. You forget the pains of childbirth. You forget, until it all happens again. But, I didn’t get baby amnesia. One of the reasons Trinity is an only child is that I never got that rose colored glow about the process of how little human beings get here. Frankly, I don’t get a rosy glow about the process of books either. I’m a pessimist. That means that I remember the bad stuff. It’s the good stuff that fades for me. The positive that I have to work hard to remember. Bad stuff remains carved in crystal for me. The sound of screams, the sound of metal twisting against metal, the look in someone’s eyes . . . I collect the terrible like snapshots in my mind. I take the happy moments, and part of my mind thinks, what if? What if it all went horribly wrong? What if this happened, instead? My mind has worked that way almost as far back as I can remember. I was like this at five or six. A life time of looking at the dark, and seeing it even in the brightest sunshine. God, I’m still depressed. But it comes and goes, and as time goes on it will go more than it stays. According to everyone here, "I always feel like this after a book." How the f**ck do I stand it?

I left a plot point hanging at the beginning of SWALLOWING DARKNESS. A big enough plot point that I couldn’t read it at the last Wolf Howl, because I needed to make those changes. I left it because I thought I might follow through with it, but in the end, it didn’t work. But it has hung over my head, so that when I typed THE END, I knew I had to change it. It was like finishing a marathon and realizing that I’d dropped my car keys somewhere along the route, and until I found them I couldn’t go home. It made the end, not really the end, because I knew even as I typed it, that I had more work.

Advice I give to new writers, and that I followed myself for years, and many books, is not to edit as you do first draft. Catch all that on the second draft. Good advice when you’re new, but now, I just hate finishing the book and knowing that things are hanging around outstanding that will have to be fixed. When I cross that finish line, I want it to be a true finish. In the interest of this, I edited the beginning of the next Anita book this morning. I’ve got the changes that were going to bug me the most smoothed out. The only change I’ll have to do after more research is the bit about phosphorus gernades. But I’ve fixed the things that were niggling at me, and would have needed changes not just at the beginning, but throughout the middle part of the book. That is no longer hanging over my head.

But part of this editing, is that I did something I’ve never done before. I started the next book, before the other was finished. I couldn’t seem to force myself to write more pages on Merry, but my muse and I weren’t done. So, I started on Anita. I got Merry done, and I’m well on my way to Anita. But, I had to stop working on it at some point and put everything I had into SWALLOWING DARKNESS. Not so I could do more pages a day, but so my imagination and my muse, and all of me could think, sleep, dream, of nothing but Merry. (Okay, I didn’t actually dream of Merry, but you get the idea.) I reached a point where even thinking too deeply about anything else was distracting from DARKNESS. So I gave myself over to that book, and only that book. That meant that I had a couple of hundred pages of a book that I hadn’t looked at in a while. So, I read it back over, and am editing as I go, just to get back in the swing of things.

I’ll be editing the next few chapters for police procedure, before I continue on. I’m pretty sure it’s not right yet, and some of the things that happen in these next chapters will potentially effect things deeper into the book, so now is the time to catch it. One of the reasons I can leave the grenades scene to be fixed later, is that nothing will build off of it. Rewrites get to be a bitch when the foundation that you’ve built the rest of book on has a crack in it. So, foundation first, then you build up. Now, having said that, if you are working on your first book I still think it’s more important to finish a rough draft, no matter how rough, first, before doing any rewriting. It’s so easy as a new writer to get caught up in perfectionism and polish those first few chapters until they shine, but you can get so busy shining up the beginning that you never finish the book. Finish the book, the rest can be fixed.

But for me, I need to crawl back into this book, and tuck it around me. I need to feel the sheets, clean and fresh against my skin. I need to remember where I was, and what we were doing. Mentally, it’s all there, but I don’t write from just the thinking bits of myself. I write from deeper in than that. So, this week to find my path again. This week to straighten up, and get things in order, before I open the spill gates and let chaos into my well-ordered fictional world. First to find out where I’ve been, then figure out where I’m going, and if it’s still the right destination, then the race is on. But this time when the race is done, I want to make sure my keys are in my pocket, and my car is waiting to take me home.

I’ve finished a book, which means I’m in my post book mood. That means, one minute I’m relieved the book is done, then next moment I’m so sad, it’s like a kind of depression. I always do this, after every book. It’s a little less because I’m so far into the next Anita book, so I’m not bereft of a project. But, it doesn’t go away completely. Having another book already well cooked does keep me from wandering from place to place like a lonely cloud on a windy day. It does keep me from going into Jon’s, or Darla’s office and taking up all of their time by just going in and talking, because I’m at loose ends. It does keep me from calling people up and wasting their time because I have no idea what to do with myself.

One of these days I’d like to finish a book and go on a trip the next day. Just get me out of town, away from the offices, and away from the scene of the crime, and to somewhere different. I wonder if that would give me something else to concentrate on. Strangely, I guess, I could do it, sort of, but it turns out that other parts of life interfer. This idea that writers can just pack up and go when and where they like doesn’t work for any writers that I know. You have other parts of your life and other responsibilities. Because I never know exactly when I’m finishing a book, it makes planning for those spontaneous trips a little difficult.

I’m out, we’re seeing a movie.

We’re back from the movie. We saw Wall-e. Trinity, Jon, and I, all loved it. One review said, finally a love story worthy of the name. All of us agree. Jon called it Toy Story and Monster Inc. good. Again, we agree. I cried for animated robots. I also smiled, laughed, cheered, and gasped, but I freaking cried for an animated robot. I have no higher praise for any movie than that it moved me through almost every emotion possible, and ended with us all agreeing that when it comes out on DVD we’ll want to own it. This is a good date movie, if you’re dating the right people, and if you aren’t what are you doing with them? It’s a great kids movie. A great family movie. It’s just a great movie. ’nuff said, we’re going to bed.

The three of us, Jonathon, Trinity, and me, went to see Hell Boy II Sunday to celebrate being done with the first draft of DARKNESS. Friends Mark and Sarah met us there, with their son, John. It was sort of a double celebration, because he’d just learned he had his first job out of college, and it’s actually in his field, using his degree. That’s getting to be rare these days. (I’m not mentioning his degree or job in detail, because I haven’t checked with them that it’s okay to mention it here. I really try to err on the side of caution when it comes to talking about other people on the blog.)

We all loved the movie. I think it may be better than the original, which is not something you get to say about most sequeals. It’s so nice that Trinity is finally old enough to see more grown-up movies. It was interesting that we all got to bring our kids. Mark and Sarah’s "kid" just happens to be in his early twenties and taller than me. But then, most people are, taller. I became friends with them when John was three, I think. So cool that he’s all grown up now.

Jonathon and I went to see Get Smart on last week’s date night. I needed something light since the book was still not done at that time. That was also a really fun movie. I’m not sure it was quite as good as Hell Boy, but they are very different movies. But I can’t remember the last summer that I saw so many good movies, and had so many more that I was looking forward to seeing. Journey to the Center of the Earth is on my want list now. Dark Knight is this weekend, I think. The third Mummy movie has Trinity, Jonathon and I all saying, yes.

I just typed THE END. 575 pages. We?re done.

It?s dark now, and the only light are the candles and the computer screen, like little islands of illumination in the darkness. I didn?t even notice it getting dark. I finished the book to Diary of Dreams, which Charles first played for us in Toronto. I?ll have to shoot him an e-mail thanking him for the music find. Of course, if Jon hadn?t had the tech skills to put it down on his iPod, I still wouldn?t have had it handy.

Jon and I took Trinity out to do the shopping I?d promised. I?d planned on finishing the book then doing the shopping. Glad I didn?t try and do it in that order, because I?d have been having to disappoint the kiddo. What time is it, anyway? Checked the clock, it?s only 9:00, which is pretty early for a marathon session for me. The latest I ever finished was 4 or 5 o?clock in the morning. That was the end of LUNATIC CAFE. So 9, that?s not bad. That?s like a full night?s sleep ahead of me. Cool.

But I?m done, I?m really done. Wow. Thank you God and Goddess, and I mean that. This book has kicked my ass.

Seventeen pages yesterday. Fourteen today. Still not done.

So many choices. I am lost. Death has come at last. We stand bloodied and unbowed with the gore of our enemies on our face, and I am content. Merry would wish it were otherwise, but neither of us is bothered by what we’ve done, only trying to figure out what to do next.

I can feel the end, as if I have reached into a dark space, and am reaching as far as my finger tips can stretch. I feel something at the very limit of my reach. I know it is the end, but I cannot see it. I cannot feel all of it. I do not know it’s shape complete, but only in the few pieces I can touch. A corner here, a smooth edge there . . . It’s there, I can feel it, but it’s just out of reach, no matter how far I stretch my fingers, my hand, my arm, my shoulder. I shove myself against the hole, and try to grab a hand hold so I can drag it out of the dark and into the light. I am no longer worried about what shape it is, or what it may be, only that it is the end. I long for the end of this book. I beat against these last few pages like the bars of some cage. I want out!

I’ve been trapped in fairie long enough, and I want concrete under my feet, and buildings looming above me. Humanity has never looked so good to Merry and me as it does in this moment. If we could only decide which way to turn, what choices to make, but they are such final choices. Make a mistake here and Merry will be paying for it, for the rest of her days. For me as a writer, it will either simplify my life or complicate into a Gordian knot, that no sword will be able to cut through. I have to be so careful not to make choices that will simply make my job easier, but hurt the series itself. I’m so tired, so very tired. Hard to think clearly.

I broke for a few minutes to do the physical therapy for my ankle. I’d hoped that would help me choose, but I’ve sat down and feel just as muddle headed. I can’t decide. I just can’t decide. So frustrating. But I’m so tired, I don’t trust myself.

When I say tired, I don’t mean physically. Any writer that’s really tackled a big project will know what I mean, when I say that my mind is tired. That part of me that gets used when I write, is tired. I need something to recharge the batteries. Sometimes, just a few minutes of doing something else is enough. Sometimes, you need to walk away for a little longer, but I’m so close to the end that I don’t want to quite. I could finish today, damit, if I could only think my way clear.

I’m going to step away from the computer for a little while. I’d promised the kiddo a trip out today, if I finished the book, but maybe I’ll do the trip now, and hope to come back to the book refreshed. Or, I’ll come back to the computer with the book dead in my hands, having lost all the momentum I’ve fought for in the last two days. It’s like rolling the dice in Vegas. If you keep going when you’re hot, sometimes you break the bank, but sometimes you roll that one time too many and you loose it all. But until the dice hit the table, you don’t know whether it will be lucky seven, or snake eyes.

Swallowing Darkness Preview Chapter, New Merchandise, Laurell Interview, Message Board, Comic News, Convention News, Newsletter, Giveaway!
SWALLOWING DARKNESS PREVIEW CHAPTER
I was hoping to have this up by now. But Laurell needs to make some adjustments to it so I cannot put it up quite yet. But as soon as I do, I promise to let everyone know.
NEW MERCHANDISE
We have a new wolf pin, a leopard and a tiger pin. The wolf and leopard come in pewter only; the tiger comes in pewter or brass.
It will come in a box. The Wolf will have the Thronnoes Rocke sticker on it. Still working on one for the Leopards and Tigers. But if you order it now, I will box it and mail you a sticker later if you like.
You can see them here:
https://www.laurellkhamilton.com/Merchandise/LKHJewelry.html
LAURELL INTERVIEW
Dragon Page did an interview with Laurell during her recent visit to Phoenix. You can hear it here:
http://www.dragonpage.com/2008/06/23…to-cover-315a/
MESSAGE BOARD
I did a bit of clean up on the message board, mostly on the top section. Any thread whose newest post was four months old got dumped. Also, some older threads that had run their course or were now irrelevant got dumped.
We took out the Comic Review section by Chris Nixon. He didn?t have time to keep it up.
We added a section for Writers Advice from Laurell. In it you will find advice for writers from the newsletter and blogs. I am putting it in sections so it is easier to find what you may want, including some really terrific links to other writers groups and organizations.
COMIC NEWS
Hardback volume #2 of Guilty Pleasures (issues 7-12) will be out July 22nd. Again, it will be available at Comic Shops and bookstores, though the comic shops will have a special cover only available at comic shops.
October 1, 2008 The Laughing Corpse issue #1 will debut.
Guilty Pleasures Comic Issue #7 is now available online at:
http://www. marvel. com/anitablake
CONVENTION NEWS
Really the con news is only relevant if you are planning on attending.
I do not yet have any info on when or what Laurell is doing. When I do I will share!
Laurell will NOT be attending ComicCon this year. Sorry! We just couldn?t fit it in.
DRAGONCON
We will have a booth! In the dealer hall (the International Hall at the Marriott Marquis) space A-55. We haven?t decided what we will be taking to offer for sale, but I am thinking on it. You may offer suggestions if you like.
Also, we will have goodies to giveaway to anyone who stops by (as long as supplies last) wearing an Anita or Merry something. Can be a t-shirt, jewelry, something you bought from us, from Caf? Press or just your own nifty handy work.
We will also try to have something for everyone who stops by or at least until we run out. Still working on this one, I have several ideas just gotta figure out which to do. Let?s hope I get it done on time!
Laurell will be in the parade. So if you want to march in the parade behind the car please feel free to join us. I will post details of when and where as soon as I have them.
ARCHON
Got this from the Archon folks:
Laurell K. Hamilton will be allowing us to raffle 6 tickets for a Sat. 5 pm ? 6pm Kaffeeklatsch for her Charity.
Prices will be the same as the other raffle for the Masquerade special seating. The lucky names will be drawn on Saturday at 4 pm, at Convention HQ and posted there.
We thank Laurell K. Hamilton for the donation and we look forward to helping her Charity, The Wild Canid Research And Survival Center aka the Wolf Sanctuary.
We will NOT have a booth at Archon. Sorry!
NEWSLETTER
The summer newsletter is late. And it will be later yet! Sorry, having some problems on this end. But I will get it out as soon as I can.
GIVEAWAY
Okay, we have several things to giveaway. So I am going to do one of the new things a month until I get them all given out.
First up: these are skins. They go on IPod Nano?s. Don?t worry it is static that makes them stick. So you can peel them off and stick em on again and again.
I have 3 to giveaway. You may enter once for each of them.
So please follow these directions!
Enter by July 17th. Drawing for winners to be held July 18th.
You can enter one of two ways. Click here for the online form or just send an email.
Details below:
Send an email to: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
In the subject line indicate which you want. So please cut and paste one of the following:
Anita Blake Was Here ? IPod Nano 3rd gen
Anita Logo ? IPod Nano 3Rd gen
Asher ? IPod Nano 1st gen
Body of the email needs to be your name and address.
We may be offering these for sale soon. We haven?t decided. I will post a poll on the message board at forum.laurellkhamilton.org and you can vote for whether we should offer them.
If you want to see them before you decide, you can find them here:
https://www.laurellkhamilton.com/Contest/IpodGiveaway.html
Devilish Details:
Non-US folks can enter. Prize will be mailed by First Class International Mail.
If prize for winner is returned by the Postal Service, alternate winner will be chosen!
Duplicate entries for a single item will be deleted.
Only one winner per email address.
You are getting the skin only. There will not be an iPod with it.
That?s it for this bit!
Smiles?.Darla

A page today. Went to the doctor. I’m still in a brace, and will be for at least two more weeks. If I do the exercises she’s given me then maybe I can get it off then. If I wear the brace I can walk the dogs starting tomorrow. If I wear the brace I can get on the treadmill at low speed. I can go back to the weights, all with wearing the brace as part of the deal. She’d like me to walk in a swimming pool without the brace, but I actually don’t have one of those. Jon suggested the hot tub. It maybe big enough for a little water pacing.

What have I done to the ankle? Simply put, too many sprains and pulls in too short a space of time. Apparently, I have to stop being all guy about my injuries and be more girl. By that, I mean I actually have to follow doctor’s advice and behave myself. Sigh. But I can walk the dogs tomorrow. Yea! I can do weights tomorrow. Double yea! Two weeks of almost no activity has driven me nuts.

Not a good day for writing. The deadline being the end of last month means that I can’t afford to give myself the luxury of not working today. I can’t just sit for hours and stare at the screen and get nothing done and say, that’s all right. It’s not all right. But the longer I sit and force myself to work, and get nothing done, the harder it is to get anything done. Writing, unlike some work, is really effected by the mood of the worker. My mood is not good.

I’ve gotten out the fine china tea cups. The hand painted ones with the little mice on them, scenes from the children’s books set in Brambly Hedge by Jill Barklem. There are four or five books with beautiful illustrations. I bought the tea set years ago when the price of it was really more than I could afford, but I’ve loved it since I bought it. With all the dogs I don’t always use it for fear of tripping puppies, but today calls for hardcore cheering up. So, the Brambly Hedge tea cups it is.

I know that some of you reading this expect me to drink out of black china, or a gargoyle mug, but sorry most of my tea cups are either cute, wildlife images, or smart ass comments. I do have a big, black mug with white headstones all over it that I really like, but other than that I don’t have many scary mugs.

I’m too bummed for Christmas music. When I can’t find any music at all that pleases me, it’s not a good sign. I wrote to Ludo the day before, and that worked. Yesterday I wrote to Seether. I tried them again earlier today, but it wasn’t working. It’s as if I have to sneak up on myself to get me to work. Wait, that’s an idea.

Not the sneaking up part, but I think I know where the wheel came off my apple cart. I think I know, maybe how to fix this hole I’ve managed to write myself into. Maybe. I’m off to jump back two chapters and do a rewrite, to see if it fixes the problem. Keep your fingers crossed.

Oh, what’s the idea? We’re too close to the end to tell you without it being a spoiler. Sorry.

Okay it’s about hour or so later. I’d fought all day and had no pages to show for it. In an hour I have seven pages. I had to loose six of the pages I wrote yesterday, and they are gone. The scene just wasn’t working, and shoving against that brick wall wasn’t going to make it become a door. So, I backed up, and rewrote myself a door. I mean that metaphorically, you understand. There are no walls, or doors in this scene. We’re outside in this scene. I lost most of yesterday’s pages, but I got to keep one, and so I’m a page farther along. Also, I’m eager to do the next day’s work. In fact, I may try and do a few more pages while there’s momentum. Maybe, or maybe that would just be asking for trouble. You know, trying to push beyond where your muse has a flashlight, so that you wonder around in the dark without a light, or a path. I feel like I’ve been running too far ahead of my muse this book, so that she keeps having to catch up with me, or shoot up a flare so I can find her. Having found my muse in the maze once more, I’m sticking to her. Handcuffs anyone? Oh, no . . ., she’s offered to hold hands if I need it, but she’s definitely frowning on the handcuffs. In fact, she’s tsking at me, that maybe the idea of force is part of my problem with this book. Every time I try to force myself beyond where my muse is ready to go, we slow, or stop. Maybe it’s a hint I should finally take. I whine at her about my deadline, and she just looks at me, with those knowing eyes. You guys know the look. The look a woman will give you when you love her, and she’s just caught you doing one of those stupid-boy things, but she loves you anyway. My muse loves me, but sometimes I’m a little too guy for my own good. Other times, it’s all that saves me.

Seven pages today. The scene only half done. Which means tomorrow’s writing session will be the second half of this scene and not the scene after. That means that I am creeping towards the finish, rather than walking. Running has been left so far behind that I don’t remember how to do it.

On the plus side we bought a new car today. We traded our Acura MDX in for a new model. It gets better gas mileage than the SUV hybrids and we’ve always been impressed with the number of people, or cargo, it carries. We thought about getting another impractical car like the Foose, but we’ve had too many days when we’ve needed the cargo space. The trips for plants for the yard would have been impossible in one of those sporty, fun cars. Not to mention road trips with more than two friends. I have to say, I have been totally spoiled about cars. I’d be much more excited if the new SUV were one of the totally impractical cars we’ve been looking at in the magazines and on line. But the next impractical car has to be Jon’s choice. I’ve got my Baby. If we do break down and get something else fast and muscle bound it’ll have to be Jon’s baby.

Before the Foose I owned an Acura TL and was very happy with it, thank you. But some cars, like some men, spoil you for the rest.