...or something. Is that too obscure a reference these days? Should I have gone with the cliche but easily recognizable "there can be only one?"

What I'm talking about is the battle royal going on over at Suvudu. They've taken a bunch of our favorite fictional characters and paired them up in head to head fights. They've chosen a pleasantly bizarre and diverse group of fighters: Gandalf, Cuthulu, and Hermione are all in there duking it out.

Flatteringly enough, Kvothe is in there too, paired up against Garret Jax.

It's a fun concept, and you get to vote on who you think should win. But what makes it truly entertaining is the brief descriptions that they give each of the characters, complete with strengths, weaknesses, and special attacks. Better still are the staff's narrative descriptions of how they think the fight would turn out.

I'll admit that I'm surprised how pleased I am at how how some of the voting is going. For example, Ged from the Wizard of Earthsea is currently kicking the stuffing out of Edward from Twilight.

Anyway. Feel free to wander over and take a look for yourself. It's a good time.

pat

[Edit: For those of you asking in the comments. I didn't send in a little blurb when I heard about the contest for two reasons. 1) Because I was really busy. And 2) I heard that Terry Brooks was too busy to send stuff in too. It didn't seem particularly fair for me to step in and stump for Kvothe when Brooks wasn't going to be able to do the same.

That said, Lewis isn't around anymore. And I've got a little time on my hands. So if Kvothe makes it to the match-up with Aslan, I might send a little blurb their way.]

Labels: cool things, fanfic, kvothe

As many of you know, a couple of days ago I decided to take a bit of a road trip down to Virginia. And, because I am an accommodating Midwesterner, I thought I might do a reading or two on my way down. So some folks could get their books signed, if they wanted.

When I posted up last week's blog looking for venues, I was hoping to maybe hear from 2 or 3 bookstores or libraries willing to help me throw a couple signings together. Maybe.

I didn't expect to get 30-40 offers. While it was terribly flattering, sorting everything out has been a bit of a logistical puzzle.

But I think I've finally got it all sussed. Here's the current list of times and places where I'll be stopping by to do readings and signings.

[Edit: All signings now confirmed.]


March 16th 7:00pm

Reading and Signing
Borders
348 East State Street
West Lafayette, IN 47906
Phone: 765-743-7775
Website


March 17th 2:00-3:00pm

Signing (No time for a reading here, I'm afraid.)
Josephbeth Book Store
692 Madison Road
Cincinnati OH 45208
Phone: 513-396-8960
Website


March 17th 7:00pm -

Reading and Signing
Josephbeth Book Store
161 Lexington Green Circle
Lexington, KY 40503-3323
Phone: 859-273-2911
Website


March 19th 6:30pm -

Reading and Signing
Prince Books
109 East Main Street
Norfolk, VA 23510-1691
Phone: 757-622-9223
Website


March 20th 2:00-4:00

Reading and Signing
Books A Million
3312 Princess Anne Road
Virginia Beach, VA 23456
(757) 368-3167‎

March 22nd 7:00pm -

Reading and Signing
Borders
6701 Frontier Drive
Springfield, VA 22150
Phone: 703-924-4894
Website


March 23rd 7:00pm -

Reading and Signing
Barnes and Noble
5500 Buckeystown Pike (Fixed. Sorry.)
Frederick, MD 21704
Phone: 301-698-0121
Website


March 24th 7:00pm -

Reading and Signing
Joesephbeth Bookseller
24519 Cedar Road
Lyndhurst, OH 44124
Phone: 216-691-7000
Website

As you can see, there's not a lot of time in between those stops. So I probably won't be adding any more stops. I'll hit somewhere in Chicago in maybe a month or two, as that's relatively close to home and I can just drive down there any old time I feel like it.

I've had several people ask, "What exactly do you do at one of these readings?"

So here's the deal.

First, I drink a strong cup of coffee. Something like a white chocolate mocha with two shots of blackberry and four sugars. This is the source of my power. After one or two of these, I look like something out of Kulba Kahn and can lift up a truck.

Second, I hang out a bit and chat with the people that show up early.

Third (Readings only) I spend about an hour reading stuff and answering questions. What I read really depends on what people are in the mood for. Sometimes I read a few humor columns. Sometimes I read a little poetry. Sometimes I read a bit of one of my books.

In between readings I answer questions about pretty much anything. Sometimes I tell stories. Sometimes I give advice. There are occasional descents into madness.

Fourth, I sign books. Generally speaking, I'll write whatever you want in a book: a quote from Bast, a profession of my undying love, a letter of recommendation to grad school.

But it's best if you give me some direction. If you say to me, "Just write whatever..." there is a very real possibility that I will simply write "Whatever" in your book.

I will also try my very best to spell your name correctly. Though sometimes I fuck up.


Caveats and Addendum:

Do not touch my baby. Little Oot will be coming with me to some of these readings and signings. If you see him, you may gaze at him adoringly or coo in his direction. But touching him his not acceptable behavior.

No offense. But I don't you. I don't know where you've been. I don't know if you might be sick, or if you've been around someone sick. You might be a sociopath. You might be from Illinois.

Here's the deal. Oot is my first baby, and I'm very protective of him. So when planning your behavior around him, it would be safest if you thought of him as a tiny bear cub, and me as his momma bear. Any sudden movements or over-familiarity might lead to sudden and terrible wrath.


We clear here? Fair warning.

I occasionally cuss. I try to restrain myself if there are tiny kids present. But if the thought of hearing the word "shit" spoken aloud horrifies you, then... well... you're probably going to be horrified.

My handwriting is not pretty. My handwriting is such that young children mock me for it. Seriously.

You can have a hug if you ask nicely...


...Just don't get all handsy on me.


Lastly, one request. Since I'm scheduling these events not even two weeks ahead of time, there really isn't much time for typical promotion to spread the word about them. Most bookstores won't even be able to get up posters advertising these signings until next week.

So if you know someone that lives in the area who might be interested in coming. I'd be much obliged if you passed the news along to them. It's always so sad when I get an e-mail that says, "I just found out you were in [insert hometown here]! I can't believe I missed it!"


Thanks so much for your help everybody,

pat

Labels: appearances, fan coolness, signing books

Lately, I've been thinking about fanfic.

This is new to me. Up until this this point in my life, I've spent more time thinking about how turtles have sex than about fan fiction.

Don't get me wrong. I don't have anything against fan fiction. It's just....

It's like this. Let's say you came up to me and said, "So, what do you think about Dnipropetrovsk?"

I would look at you blankly.

Then you would say, "Dnipropetrovsk? Major Ukrainian industrial center?"

To which I would shake my head dumbly.

Dismayed, you would continue, "Come on! It's the third largest city in the Ukraine! More than a million people live there! How can you not know about Dnipropetrovsk?"

At this point in the conversation, I would probably explain that I'm sure that Dnipropetrovsk plays a vital role in a lot of peoples' lives. I'd admit that I'm not surprised that folks have strong feelings about how it used to be a major military asset for the USSR. I'm sure that a lot of people live, breathe, and spend a big chunk of their waking time thinking about Dnipropetrovsk.

But I'm just not one of those people. I've never known anyone from there. Never visited. Never seen a movie set in the city. For all these reasons, Dnipropetrovsk has been off my radar for my entire life.

It's the same thing with fan fiction.

Admittedly, in these last several years, I've become aware of fan fiction through a slow osmosis. At any given convention there are going to be panels on the subject. You'll hear conversations in the hall. Occasional jokes.

Even so, fan fiction has only been dimly present on the edge of my perception.

The one notable exception is that I've known, sooner or later, that someone was going to do fan fiction about my stuff. Using my characters. Set in my world.

Truth is, I've looked forward to it. When people start writing fan fiction about your stuff, it shows that your writing has attained a level of popularity. It's like fanart, in my opinion. No matter how you feel about the art itself, the fact that someone went out of their way to do it is really flattering.

That's the most I ever thought about it. The thought of folks writing a Potter vs. Kvothe cage match never really bugged me.

How other writers feel on the subject has never concerned me very much. I know emotions tend to run hot on the subject. Some people love fan fiction. Some people hate it. Some people view it as legally actionable, others see it as a crime against god and nature.

The first people I met who were firmly on one end of the spectrum are the awesome folks who won the photo contest that I ran a while back. The first time I ever met them out at Gencon, they expressed a firm distaste for fanfic. They even made up this picture for me.



When I went down to Indianapolis a year ago, I they dressed up for a reading I did at their local library. And, as a joke, I had Kvothe and Bast pose for kiss because we were talking about the bit of Yaoi that got written.

You can see from the expression on Kvothe's face that she doesn't condone this sort of behavior.


It didn't really strike me as odd that people who engaged in cosplay would look down on people who wrote fan fiction. There is a viscous of territorialism in geek society, as shown by this flow chart that Brunching Shuttlecocks put together years ago:




It reminds me of a quote that used to get tossed around when I was in grad school. "Why is the competition on academia so fierce? Because the stakes are so low."

I think some similar psychological force is at play in geekdom.

Hold on.... I just realized something. Our award-winning cosplayers, by putting together a series of images that tell a story have created a narrative. A narrative that features characters someone else created.

Does that make their entry to the photo contest fan fiction? Are they all closet fanficers?

Whoo boy. I'm glad I'm not there to hear the great wailing and gnashing of teeth right now. I'm guessing those are fighting words....


Anyway, I always figured how people felt about fanfic was a personal issue. It's like Jefferson said: "It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."

That's been my philosophy. You love fanfic? Fine. You hate it? Also fine. It really doesn't effect my life in the least.

But then I accidentally wrote a piece of fan fiction, and everything changed....


(Stay tuned for part two, space cowboys.)

pat

Labels: cosplay, delicious fanarts, fanfic

For those of that might be interested, I have a couple appearances coming up in the next couple of months. You can see details on the tour page.

I'll be adding more dates to the tour page as new things get scheduled. I'm cutting down on my conventions a little this year because of Oot. But I will be attending PenguiCon this year. (And San Diego Comic Con, if I can somehow get hold of a badge.)

Plus, I'm thinking of taking a little road trip.

You see, Sarah has a family wedding that she really wants to go to down in Virginia Beach. Since I'm not thrilled with the thought of taking Oot on a plane, we're going to be driving down.

This means I'm going to be traveling through a big piece of the US I've never visited before. And whenever that happens, I wonder if there might be a bookstore or a library in the area that would be interested in hosting a reading/signing....

The wedding is on the 21st of March. That doesn't leave us a lot of time....

So here's the deal.

Here are the two potential routes I can take down to Virginia beach:



You can also go look at the google map directly if you follow THIS LINK.

If you live in this part of the country and want to help set up a reading/signing there are two options.


If you happen to own, manage, or work in a bookstore or library somewhere on this blue line, and you'd like to set up a reading/signing, you should drop me a via the contact form on the webpage.


If you don't manage a bookstore or a library, but you still want to help lure me into your neck of the woods, you could go ask your local bookstore/library to see if they'd like to host an event. Then, if they're interested, you can have them drop me a line. Again, using the contact form.


I know this is a relatively tight timetable, but I think we can make it work.

As an added incentive, if we do set up a reading or two, you can be relatively sure that you'll get to hear a bit of The Wise Man's Fear, as well as get a sneak peek at The Adventures of the Princess and Mr. Whiffle.



A few helpful tips:

1. If you post a comment below that says, "Come to Cleveland!1!!!" it will not in any way facilitate my coming to Cleveland.

Like I said above, I need to get in contact with someone who has the authority to set up an event.

1b. Ditto about sending me the phone number of a local bookstore. I just don't have the time to call 100 places and track down the two or three that might be interested. It's way better if YOU call them and ask them. Then, if they're interested, you can send me a message with their contact information.

2. Please take note of the blue line in the map above. If your hometown/bookstore isn't on that blue line, it's going to be a lot harder for me to make the trip. I'm spending 40 hours driving down and back to Virginia. Since I have my baby with me, I'm not eager to add a long side trip.

2b. New York and Boston are not close to the blue line, just in case you were wondering.

2c. If you want to lure me off the blue line, it will probably require some manner of lavish bribe or exceptionally exciting venue.

2d. I will make one exception to 2c. If there's a willing bookstore in Canton, OH, I'll make the trip. Because it will give me an excuse to wear my Jayne hat, and sing "The Hero of Canton" at the reading.

3. Your house is not a viable venue for a reading. A good venue should have seating for at least 40 people and hopefully some way of selling books. A nearby coffeeshop is also a plus.

I honestly have no idea if this will work. But I'm guessing out of the thousands of people who read the blog, at least a few of them have to work in bookstores and libraries. I love doing readings and signings, so I'm hoping we can set up at least a couple appearances so I can meet some of y'all down there in the southeast.

Rest assured I'll post up a blog as soon as we manage to set anything up.

Thanks for your help,

pat

Labels: appearances, calling on the legions, The Princess and Mr. Whiffle

So today I was going to pass along some news about the book in a blog titled, "Why I don't talk about Book Two."

Here's the news: I've finally finished my latest draft of The Wise Man's Fear.


Oot is shown in order to give a sense of scale. And because my baby is frikkin adorable.



So before we all go leaping to a bunch of unfounded and erroneous conclusions, let's talk about a few things.




Is this going too fast for anyone?









The book is a big step closer to being done.

The book is way better than it was before. That last draft of the book was okay. It had some great parts, some parts that were "meh" and some that were "huh?" Overall, it averaged out to about 70 percent awesome.






Then, depending on how much work we think it needs. We put it into the production schedule. That means we'll have a publication date. Which I will tell you. On the blog. With words.


But first, I get to relax. I've been working on this fucker nonstop for months. And now, finally, I get to take a break while I wait for Betsy's feedback.




pat

Labels: book two, lesbian unicorns, Oot

For those of you who have never been there, Powell's Books is like no other bookstore I've ever seen.

It takes up a whole city block. As I mentioned before on the blog, I've only been there once, and that was only for a bare 45 minutes or so. Even so, that was enough time for me to get lost.

And I'm not speaking metaphorically here. I was actually physically lost. Lost as in, "I don't know where I came in or how I can get out."

Simply said, if heaven turns out to be something like Powell's, I wouldn't complain too much.

As if that weren't enough coolness all by itself, a friend recently stopped there and snapped a few pictures of what he found.


Awww.... Thank you Powell's.


Wow. That's unprecedentedly forthright. Thanks again, Powell's.

And just a couple days ago, someone sent me a link to Powell's "Puddly Awards" where customers and staff pick their favorite books. Even better, Powell's then sells those books at a discount until the end of February. So you've still got a week or so to take advantage of it.

That's the hat trick. Thanks a third time, Powell's.

More soon,

pat

Labels: accolades, book two, cool things

Well, it took a little doing, but at this point we've got 99.9% of the raffle prizes packaged up and in the mail.


Valerie did most of the packing and mailing, with solid assistance from a few others including Sarah and Oot. Though really, I don't know if what Oot does can be considered assistance. Personally, I think he's the weak member of the team. But Sarah and Valerie place great stock in cuteness, cooing, and the desire to bounce up and down while being held.

I don't doubt that some of the books have already started arriving at the winners' houses. If you'd like to send in a picture of you loving you cool new books, feel free to mail them to: paperback.contest [squiggly atsign thinger] gmail.com.

I helped with some of the packaging, but Valerie has perfectionist tendencies, and I tend to be a hardline proponent of function over form. After one particularly ugly wrapping job, I was told that my time would perhaps be better spent doing something else, like bouncing little Oot.

Personally, I thought the package was a marvel of engineering. Nigh-indestructible, in fact.


Sure it's ugly, but it gets the job done. (I'm talking about the package.)

Anyway, the upshot is that the girl members of Team Elodin did most of the post-fundraiser sorting and shipping. Which is nice, as it freed me up to concentrate on the book.

And yes, I'll be posting up news about that soon, so y'all can stop asking.

And no, there isn't a publication date yet, so y'all can stop asking about that too.

I mean seriously. If the book had a solid pub date, don't you think I'd mention it? Do you think I'd sit here at home, rubbing my hands together and chortling: "Yes! If I withhold this information another week, I'm sure to get another 100 e-mails asking me about the book!"

Yup. That's exactly what I'd do. Because obviously I am some sort of alien life form that lives on snarky fanmail and bitchy blog comments. Since I became stranded on your strange world years ago, they have been my only means of sustenance.

That's really the only explanation that makes any sense... Unless, of course, the reason I haven't posted up any news is simply because there *isn't* any news.

Now that I *do* have some news, I'll write a post about it. It's that simple. These things don't happen faster because you ask for them, you realize. Quite the opposite, in fact.

So, if you care about that sort of thing, stay tuned. I'm planning on titling the post: "Why I Don't Talk About Book Two."

Oddly enough though, I *will* be talking about book two in that particular blog. Go figure.

pat

Labels: book two, Worldbuilders 2009