Don't Buy Me These Things for Christmas...

...but I do love them.

Herewith a random list of things I've spotted during the holiday season that I might, in another life, want for myself. BUT DON'T BUY THEM FOR ME.  I mean it. Many of them are way too expensive. Others I just don't have room or time for.

But they are pretty cool....

For example. The only way you should ever have an animal head on your wall:

Savannah Story Bust from anthropologie. Also available in rhino, gazelle, giraffe, and elephant.

My cat doesn't particularly like to be up high. She's weird like that, but if she did, I'd get her:

The Cat Clouds Cat Shelf from therefinedfeline.com.

Not to mention the world's most attractive cat tree:

The Lotus Cat Tower. From the same store.

Again, I don't have room for this, but if I did I'd be sorely tempted. It's a gorgeous poster of a painting of one of the all time great race horses, whom you all probably know I've seen race in person:

Available in Zenyatta's own online shop.  Those Zenyatta Way Street Signs are also tempting. But I have enough Zenyatta stuff up already.

My next selection is so ridiculous that it's almost awesome. A slanket covered with... skulls!

It's a reversed blanket that will keep you cozy while you sit like a lump, but hey, it's got skulls on it, so it's BAD ASS, right? Wear this and you are one BAD ASS couch potato, bay-bee! Available at Thinkgeek.com here.

I will never be able to justify buying this, given the expense. But oooh, yum:

 Laphroaig's 21-year-old single malt scotch.  Finally, a whisky old enough to drink.

You should never buy a pet as a surprise gift for anyone. And you should always adopt your pet from a shelter or rescue organization.  That said, since this is a fantasy post about gifts NOT to get me...

I ran into a gorgeous, sweetheart of a Newfoundland at the pet store the other day, and she won my heart. I've always loved bigger dogs, and this one was all huge webbed paws and "rub my belly please."  Newfies are smart, family friendly, and protective without being scary.  I'd never get a pet from a breeder since there are so many rescues out there.  But I do love me a big sweet dog.  German Shephards and other shephard breeds are also very high on my favorite list. But I haven't met a dog I didn't like.

Not sure how often I'd wear this, but it sure is lovely.

The Egyptian Lotus Necklace from the Met Museum Store. They have plenty of less expensive and still quite lovely things there, if you know someone who's a history/archaeology buff like me.

I'm not the type to ever own a bar or restaurant. But over the weekend I attended an event here:

The Wellsbourne on Pico in West Los Angeles. All old dark wood, shelves with books, shiny bar, and big comfy booths. I had a Pimm's Cup there (the cocktails are all old fashioned) which was delicious, and the tab came to me inside a hollowed out book. So if I ever were to own a bar, it'd be a place like this.

An Easy Way to Help Save the Tiger

The main character in my book, Otherkin, is a teen girl who discovers she can shapeshift... into a tiger.

Why?

'Cause tigers are so damned cool.

(Plus it helped me address themes of environmentalism, body image... oh who cares? The main thing is that tigers are the awesomest animal ever!)

But in the wild, tigers are critically endangered, along with many other big cats. Which is why you see a link to a conservation organization called Panthera on this blog. They are doing a lot to help save big cats in the wild.

And now there's a petition from UK organization Tiger Time, asking the Chinese government to stop legal tiger farming in that country.  It's a critical step in helping wild tigers for many reasons - like the farms are used as a smokescreen for selling wild tiger skins and parts.

You can find out more and sign the petition in a super fast, easy interface here.

It could really make a difference.

Thankfulness

This day before Thanksgiving I find myself very thankful for:

Fingers to type Book 2 (and another secret project) with
A steady job to pay the bills and stimulate my mind
My agent
My editor
That my book will go on sale next year (!)
Parents who love to read, and love me too
Friends who make me laugh and grow
Fellow writers who give me great notes and ideas and support
Bags of trail mix to keep me going between meals
Roasted brussell sprouts (yes, really)
The color forest green
A world that still has wild tigers in it
Writers like EB White, Charles Dickens, CS Lewis, and Jane Austen to inspire

Words, words, words

The Cutest Darned Birds of Prey aka...

Owlses!



My book Otherkin features a bird of prey, but it never occurred to me to have someone stroke his head and send him into a state of utter bliss. Hmm. I am writing book 2 right now...

The Week in Review

This week was a roller coaster.

1. My kitchen got rained on by busted pipes from my upstairs neighbor, who was out of town. My slumlord landlady could not be reached (the number she gave was a fax machine) and every building manager and repairman I'd ever been in touch with over the years had quit working for her. It took me three days of dogged detective work, pleading, and threatening to get her to agree to fix the pipes, get a repairman, and arrange for the upstairs neighbor (a great guy) to get his keys to the repairman.

It took the repairman (Gregory, also a nice guy) ten minutes to fix the problem.

Now I'm just grateful that my kitchen is dry. Simple pleasures.

2. I didn't sleep for two nights straight because of the very loud leaking pipes, my hatred for having something go wrong in my nest (er, apartment), and my lack of control over getting anything fixed because all power lay in the hands of my evil landlady. Other things I can't discuss were going on too. So I walked around like Queen Zombie until the leak was fixed and sleep konked me on the head.

3. I didn't get nearly enough writing done (see above), but I did come up with some great stuff in my head that I can't wait to get down on paper. Hello, weekend!

4. The cd player in my car broke, and I haven't had time to get a new one. So I've been listening to these things once known as "cassette tapes." Via these old compilations I rediscovered my love for "old" songs like 1979 by the Smashing Pumpkins, Big Bang Baby by Stone Temple Pilots, and She Will Have Her Way by Neil Finn.

But I'm itching to play some stuff I just downloaded (The Decemberists latest, for starters) and can't listen in the car!  So a new stereo beckons. This one will have the capability to play mp3 files too. Though I still prefer the less compressed full sound you get from cds.

5. My friends kept me sane this week. Keep your friends close.

6. I've seen the cover for my novel. Can't share yet. But let's just say... tiger.

There is no cooler word.

"He's the kind of man a woman would have to marry to get rid of." - Mae West in She Done Him Wrong.

Be Like the Bird

"Be like the bird that, passing on her flight awhile on boughs too slight, feels them give way beneath her, and yet sings, knowing that she hath wings." -- Victor Hugo

Save the Snow Leopard!

If you go to SnowLeopard.Org and vote, you could help save not only snow leopards, but help people in nearby communities, and the ecosystems that support this top predator.

Check out the video below if you're wondering how that works, plus revel in some amazing footage of these elusive, magnficent creatures:

Joss is boss

Duh.

Happy Halloween

Last night, the Saturday before Halloween, I went to a concert at the El Rey Theater here in LA to see Amanda Palmer and Jason Webley perform.

The crowd alone would have made it worth the $25. I saw everything from a Victorian chorus girl to a lady sperm, with an emphasis on lots of black, fedoras, and tulle skirts, on both sexes.

Then Jason Webley came out and made playing an accordian sexy. Later, to the strains of Thriller he climbed into and out of a giant red balloon.

I'm getting too old to stand in a dark room with strangers for over three hours, but then Amanda came on and showed us what passion is with gut wrenching renditions of songs like Astronaut and Ampersand. And I was very glad to be there.

Particularly moving to me was a new song she said was about one of her major influences, writer Judy Blume. When she puts it on the web I'll post a link because it really shows why writing for kids is so important. It reminded me of how I felt when I first read Deanie, and why I write what I write.

Top Five Hawaiian Recordings

You'd never know it by looking at me, but I was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii.  It was truly a wonderful place to grow up, and part of the fun there was Hawaii's unique melting pot culture.

So, to introduce you to some of the Hawaii I grew up in, below are my top five Hawaiian recordings . I say "recordings" instead of songs, because one is a comedy routine by the brilliant Rap Reiplinger. I'm curious as to whether the local humor translates to those who don't know the islands very well. But let me tell you, when we were kids, he was our comedy idol, and to kama'ainas (locals) he's both legendary and hilarious.

1. "Ulili E" - Gabby Pahinui
 There's no video of the late great Gabby Pahinui currently available doing this classic Hawaiian song. But just listen to what the man can do with a ukelele. It's in Hawaiian, but all you need to know is that it's about a bird, named in the title. Gabby's fingers on the strings and his voice do all the translating you need.

2. "Ku'u Home O Kahalu'u - Olomana
This is probably my favorite local song of all time. When I listen to it, I see the windward side of Oahu (where the town of Kahalu'u is), and I remember all the times I spent with my friends on the beach in Kailua, hiking Mount Olomana, driving the Old Dump Road at high speeds way past somebody's curfew, grabbing a shave ice, or bodysurfing at my favorite place on Earth - Bellows Beach. But this song perfectly captures the bittersweetness of memory, even if you've never been to Hawaii.

3. "Honolulu City Lights" - Keolo & Kapono Beamer

A prom theme many years running, a song we sung in choir, sappy and strong and sweet. I love Honolulu.

4. "Far Too Wide For Me" - The Peter Moon Band
I would listen to this when I was horribly homesick for the islands, far across one sea or another.  The "Cane Fire" album by The Peter Moon Band is one of my all time favorites.

5. "Room Service" - Rap Reiplinger

Just a classic. If you understand this, you understand the islands.

Official Author Photo

Is that really me?

Thanks to Joe Camareno for taking the photo, and to wonderful make up artist Ramona Doerning for her steady hand and with the blush.

How I Survived my Author Photo Shoot

Thank goodness for good friends with good connections.  That's how I found a terrific photographer to take the headshot I'll be using as THE photo on my books and all that kind of jazz.

I'm not an actor or performer, so I'm not the most comfortable person in front of the camera. The photo you see currently on my blog is one I took myself, in my own bathroom mirror.  I find that a much more comfortable way to get my photo taken than to pose for other people.

Okay, I can be a bit of a goofy ham when I feel comfortable. Which is why it was great having Joe shoot my photos, since he was so easy to chat with and told me to "flutter my eyelashes" at the beginning of the shoot.

Still, it took me awhile to warm up.  Later, as I went through the (over a thousand!) photos, I noticed how sort of squinty and skeptical I looked in the early shots.  Sort of a "Is this really necessary?" attitude.  Which isn't fair, since I set the whole thing up and yes, it is necessary, thank you very much Nina, you squinty skeptic.

It was kind of surreal, going through all those close ups of myself.  I re-noticed my grayish front gums (thanks to a bike accident I had when I was ten that knocked my front teeth out and lead to all sorts of traumatic dental fun over the years), and how I seem to like the left side of my face better than my right given how I angle it toward the camera pretty consistently. 

And ah, the schnozz.  It's a gift from my Berry forebears. My beloved Aunt Janet had this nose, until she got a nose job in her twenties.  No nose job for me, thanks.  I love my big schnozz, my freckles, my squinty green eyes, my weird gums, and tendency to smirk. It's easy to love beauty and symmetry. More a point of pride to love your own faults.  It's a struggle, one that will go on my whole life, I suppose, but I'm determined to keep at it. Beats hating yourself!

The main thing, as a redhead, is to wear green. I'm not kidding. For someone with my coloring, it's like a magic trick to make your hair look good, you eyes glow, and your skin say 'Thank you!"

One thing you can be sure of, this photo will NOT be my author headshot. Though I love it for obvious reasons:

I'll post the official photo when it's ready. Meanwhile, am treasuring the ugly/goofy/crazy face photos too.

My Book's on Amazon!

I'm on vacation, typing away here in on my bed in my motel room, with travel buddy Wendy on the other bed doing the same, and she just casually says - Otherkin's on Amazon.

WHAT?

So yeah, it is.  Here.

No cover. No info. But HOLY DINNER PLATES! 

There's, like, a release date and everything.  I had no idea.  July 31, 2012.  Sounds good to me.

Who are we kidding?  Sound great to me!

Maine, the first day

View from our window, Maine. That's our deck, with chairs, and the dunes and Atlantic beyond.

Then once I get to the beach, I'm out there with no one but a lone surfer and a friendly gull for company. I find a huge empty blue gray shell, and then sit on a bench to breathe in the ocean and sky.

Back at our motel, Wendy and the Teddy on my bed enjoy their books.

King's Chapel and Burying Ground

Boston. One thousand bodies. Only 505 headstones.

I'm weird. I love cemeteries.

Wonderland

You've got to love a town where the last stop is Wonderland. Yay for Boston.

What's on My Wall

I found this at a Polish photography studio called Stereolit and had to have it and two others.The photographer, Piotr Vasco Wasilkowski, titled it "Bloody Skeletons and Wolves Howling."  I framed the photos, then grouped all three in a vertical line down the wall. To me they tell a different story every time I look at them. Sometimes this photo is the beginning of the story, sometimes the middle, and sometimes... the end.

If you're in the mood, visit Kasia and Piotr on Stereolit's website. They made it very easy for me to buy the photos online, and they arrived very quickly, in perfect shape.  I just love them.

What's on your wall? And why?

Advice for Young Writers

Happy Birthday, John Lennon

Dreaming of a world where John Lennon still lives. Dreaming of a better life. Dreaming of his dream.

Cover Copy

My latest learning experience as a soon-to-be published author has been in writing/editing cover copy for one's own book.  The lesson is this:

It's really fricking hard.

My fabulous (truly, she is wonderful, so colloborative, insightful, nice...) editor sent me her company's first stab at the copy for the front and back cover of my book, and invited me to give her my thoughts.  Now, I work in Hollywood by day, where writers get no say in the taglines for their TV shows.  Vast publicity and marketing departments determine how a film or show will be presented to the public, and as a writer you just sit there and are grateful you got paid to write the script.  So this was rather revolutionary to my way of thinking. Asking the writer's opinion?  On anything?  As a writer I have to say - Huzzah!

I liked a lot about the copy they sent me but because I'm so close to the material, I, of course, had opinions. Hey, I'm an opinionated person about most things. But about my book?? Puh-lease. I try NOT to think of it as my baby, but you get the idea...

I wrote them down. I tried to be more clever than the copy they sent. I read the back covers of tons of other books.

Okay, maybe not non-fiction books like this, but you see what I mean. I rifled through my library, focusing on YA books. Hard backs didn't help me much, since they often don't have any copy on the back. Also, everything on my Kindle was pretty useless for these purposes.  (Poor Kindle users don't get to see the pretty pretty covers or read the blurbs we writers work so hard to get!)  But fortunately for these purposes, I'm a total book hoarder.

But really, that wasn't very useful because there were infinite ways to approach writing back cover copy. Do you tell a bit of the story, naming the main characters, and being very explicit about the main conflict?  Here's the text of the back cover of the UK copy of GAME OF THRONES:

In the game of thrones, you win or you die.

As Warden of the north, Lord Eddard Stark counts it a curse when King Robert bestows on him the office of Hand. His honour weighs him down at court where a true man does what he will, not what he must. . . and a dead enemy is a thing of beauty. The old gods have no power in the south, Stark's family is split, and there is treachery at court. Worse, a vengeance mad boy has grown to maturity in exile in the Free Cities beyond the sea. Heir of the mad Dragon King deposed by Robert, he claims the Iron Throne.

Or do you show the conflict, but emphasize mostly emotion? Here's the back of Stephanie Meyer's YA blockbuster, TWILIGHT, with what I think is a masterful pitch on the back cover.

Or do you tantalize and tease, hoping to ensnare folks with just enough of a mystery that they want to find out more? Check out the back cover copy for Karsten Knight's new YA book, WILDFIRE:

I am the fieriest depths of hell

I am the surface of the sun.

I am the belly of a volcano.

I am the unstoppable force that

has formed new islands, and the

same unstoppable force that has

brought cities to their knees.

I am the volcano goddess who has

survived a thousand years.

I am Ashline Wilde, and I may

not survive another thousand

years, but I'll go down in flames

before I go up in smoke.

Intrigued?  That's what they're hoping.

I pretty much tore my hair out over the weekend trying variations of all three approches.  I reread most of my book, hoping to pick out useful quotes.  I consulted my critique partner, doubted everything I'd ever written, then kept going back to the thesaurus to make sure there wasn't a better word in there for "power" or "lurk" or "prowl." I ended up going for the more mysterious sort of copy.  My editor approved, but cleaned it up and made it much better, much less awkward. Now we think we've basically got it.  

Is it perfect? No.

Will you get to see it here right now?  Nope. Sorry. Not yet.  (Told you we went for the more mysterious/tantalizing type of copy.)

Will I think of a dozen other ways it could have gone?  Yep.

But I really do need to get to wrapping up my outline for book 2 so I can write the darned thing.  Can't dwell on stuff too long, or you go crazy and never get anything done.

But hat's off to the publicity and marketing folks who come up with this stuff. 'Cause it ain't easy.

'Ware the Apocalypsies!

Thanks to the brilliant Gretchen McNeil (have you read her book POSSESS yet? You must!) I've just joined a group of YA authors called The Apocalypsies, all whom have debuts just before and during 2012, the year to end all years...

Yet another example of how stunningly supportive and nice the YA writing community is. Seriously, the writers I've met (and editors, and agents) have all been nothing but kind and nice and all those words that sound so boring but are actually really great.

The writers are all really funny and talented too, but you already knew that.

My info's not up on the site yet, since this JUST happened. But I'm psyched!  I'll get to meet fellow writers as well as support them.  It's not very apocalyptic, but this is how I feel right now:

National Feral Cat Day Coming Up!

Did you know that if you catch and kill all the feral cats in an area, that area just fills up again with cats?

But if you trap, neuter, and return those animals to that area, the population stabilizes, no new kittens are born, the lives of the returned, neutered cats are improved, and behaviors like yowling, mating, and fighting stop.


Yep, cats have been in the wild, living near humans for over 10,000 years.  They deserve to be respected as much as any other animal. Killing them doesn't work. Trap, Neuter, Return (TNR does. It's been well documented.  Don't believe me?  Check out Alley Cat Allies and learn.

This October 16 is National Feral Cat Day, promoting compassion for cats.

Oh, and cats aren't responsible for the lower numbers of songbirds and other resident species.  Human beings are. We need to use these big brains of ours to make the world safe for birds, cats, and people.  Together we can do it.

Vonnegut on Stories

A funny bit of writing advice from one of my favorite writers.



I'm outlining book 2 right now. This made me think perhaps I'm overthinking things a bit...

Giant Rubber Bunny Suits or What Not to Put in Your Biography

So I have to write my bio today, that thing that describes me on the back of my book.  Somehow, as soon as I heard that, my mind went completely blank, as if I knew nothing about myself.

Serious or silly?  Short, for sure. But just how boastful or loony should I be?  What, if anything, in my life, is really relevant?  What would folks actually care about?

This is a good problem to have, don't get me wrong. It's thrilling to think that info about me will appear on a book by me.  It's mind-boggling, in fact. But I find it hard to describe myself.  Tall, red hair, prone to using a long word when a short one will do...

A friend on Facebook suggested I do a bio from the POV of a tiger.  Very cool idea!  However, after writing something like: "Nina Berry smells like cantaloupe and single malt scotch," I thought better of it.

Another friend offered to write it for me. But I've known her since sixth grade, and she knows waaaaay too much about me.  I mean, we used to sing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" after French in the most hideous high pitched tones and imagine certain teachers who shall remain nameless dressed in giant rubber bunny suits, for crying out loud.

Sigh.  Off to try to find a balance between giant rubber bunny suits and "I went to college in Chicago."  Wish me luck.

Yes, it's September 11, ten years after, and I'm not going to turn on the TV.  I didn't watch much TV ten years ago either.  I went to work and worried.  I'm worried still.  I'm not even going to stay on the internet much longer. I need to write and move on and be present, not past.

It's a beautiful day here in Los Angeles. The gold sunlight is filtering through the vines that creep over my living room window. And because I'm in a bit of a mood I can't help remembering how Natalie loved those vines, and how Max used to bask in the puddles of sunshine. They're both gone now. And I'm here appreciating it for them.  Not much else we can do for those who have died and left their mark on us.

Back to work.

My Book's on Goodreads!

The news came to my Inbox thanks to a Google Alert, looking like this:

Web 1 new result for "Nina Berry"

Nina Berry (Author of Otherkin) Nina Berry is the author of Otherkin (0.0 avg rating, 0 ratings, 0 reviews, published 2012) www.goodreads.com/author/show/5145815.Nina_Berry

You can imagine how quickly I clicked on that link.  I have no idea how this happens, but my book just appeared on the Goodreads site, and people have already signed on as "to be read."

*Nina's Head Explodes*

God, I love the internet.

I have no idea if I should be doing anything to fill out the author info or anything.  I shall do my research.  Until then:  WOO HOO!

Otherkin

 

by
Nina Berry

My rating:

add to my books

Otherkin

by Nina Berry

0.00  ·  rating details  ·  0 ratings  ·  0 reviews

Nina Berry's OTHERKIN, in which a girl discovers she can shift into a tiger and is introduced into a world where people and objects aren't what they seem.

Expected publication: August 2012 by K Teen

Evocatively Moldering

After reading about writer Ransom Riggs's blog Strange Geographies, with its fascinating photos of forgotten places, I googled "detroit photo abandoned" to find again a photo essay I'd seen awhile back of shots of abandoned buildings in Detroit.

Turns out a couple of French photographers, Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre, shot the photos, which were picked up by Time Magazine, which called the subsequent photo essay Detroit's Beautiful, Horrible Decline.

The photos really are remarkable:

They evoke strange, twisted feelings and longings and half-stirred stories inside me.  You can almost feel the ghosts brushing past you.

I tried to write a short story in college called "Evocatively Moldering" after I took Art History and was taken with that phrase, uttered by my professor, to describe how the Romantic painters of the 19th century liked their buildings.  They liked ruins clutched in vines, rotting, empty, suggesting a semi-forgotten past now merging with encroaching nature.

Looks like our own cities are now becoming something the Romantics would like to look at. Not to live in, of course. They had cozy homes stuffed with trinkets for that.

What is it about the sight of decay that inspires stories?   Do you want to tell us how that empire declined?  Is it nostalgia?  Or perhaps it's knowing that one day we too will be gone, and probably forgotten, just as the people who once dwelled in these ruins are.  By making up their stories, we can pretend we are also preserving ourselves for just a little bit longer.

Editors Rock

I have long known that the folks involve in writing for kids are wonderful.  As soon as I joined SCBWI, I found myself in the company of many generous, kind, funny, smart, supportive people.  I've heard that it's different in adult publishing - more cutthroat.  I don't know.  But in kid lit, most people are just, well, nice. My agent, Tamar Rydzinski, more than proved it in all of her dealings with me - so fair, kind, perceptive, and intelligent.

This whole appreciation for the niceness/wonderfulness/general awesomeness of KidLitters rose to a new height this week after my first chat with my editor, Alicia.  Not only was she Queen of Nice, she really really GOT my book.

Those of you who write alone in the dark, wondering if you're insane to try to be a writer will have a glimmer of understanding of just how wonderful this is.  While you're typing/scribbling away, you secretly fear that no one will ever truly understand what you're going for on paper.  And you secretly dream that at least one person will read it one day and go - aha!

The dream part of all that happened to me this week while talking to Alicia.  She understood the whole subliminal body image issue I tried to sneak into my book.  She loved that a group of friends plays a crucial role in the story.  She "grokked" my world building, big time.

Can I just say - this is the way to my heart?  Read my stuff, love it, get it, tell me all about it, and I'll love you forever.  I'm easy like that.

Sure, she had notes.  She'll have more.  What notes she did have were so on the money it was scary.  I can't wait to see her line edits.  Seriously!  There's nothing like taking a manuscript you love and  making it  better.  It satisfies something way down deep in my soul.

So, future novelists/writer - I want you to know that editors rock.  Yes yes, self publishing/epublishing are flourishing and more power to those self-propelled successes.  But, for one, am so damned glad I have an editor.  I want my book to be as good I can make it.

Is This Heaven?

I Love Los Angeles

People who've never lived in LA love to diss it. I've had very good friends and relatives look at me like I was nuts when I said I loved living here. They talk about the traffic and the smog and the earthquakes and the supposed lack of culture. They look down their noses at folks who live here. I hope it makes them feel good.

Because they're wrong.

I grew up in paradise - Honolulu, Hawaii, that is. I know a great place to live when I see one. Hawaii is a great place to live.

So is Los Angeles.

Yes, LA has some traffic issues. Hell, I was here for the gigantor Northridge Quake in '94. I know it's not perfect here. Nowhere is perfect. I'm not going to go into how San Francisco also has traffic and quakes, or how Hawaii has vog (volcano smog) and higher expenses, or how NYC is way too pricey or Chicago has winters that can freeze your lungs with one breath. Every place has good things and bad things. I'll cop to traffic and earthquakes, with occasional side dishes of wildfires.

But those who love to try new things or just want to find like-minded people to hang with, LA is a wonderland. I was just talking about this at lunch today with fellow denizen Amy, and she pointed out that she ran across a group in Long Beach that gets together to sing sea shanties.

You can do anything in LA.

Want world class art? Try the Getty or LACMA or MOCA. Want to play hockey, eat Ukrainian food, then hit a jazz club? Come to LA. Hit the ski slopes (in winter) in the morning, then have dinner by the beach. Watch an old movie on the big screen at the Egyptian Theater, then have dinner down the street where Thai Elvis sings. Watch people from every walk of life take the metro or get their photo taken with Spiderman on Hollywood Boulevard. Or take yoga from a world class teacher on Montana Ave, then ride the ferris wheel on Santa Monica pier. Take a lesson in trapeze while you're at it.

You can be anything, watch anything, eat anything, try anything. It's a rich life in Los Angeles, even if you don't make a lot of money. And the weather? Let's just say it's August, and on the westside it's about 75 degrees at Noon.

And it's beautiful here. Yield to the loveliness of LA. Watch the video below.

LA Light from Colin Rich on Vimeo.

Wednesday - Embarrrassing or Not? Confession

I had a huge crush on Captain Kirk from Star Trek.  Particularly the season one Captain Kirk, still trim, young, and manly.

I watched the show obsessively (it was in reruns), and even at that age I could see the difference between the Kirks of season 1 and season 3.

Season 1:

Season 3:

Not that I would've kicked Season 3 Kirk out of bed for eating Fig Newtons. By the time we got to the movies, the feeling had waned. But I was watching a few moments of Season 1's "Conscience of the King" with my Dad last night, and he actually said, "William Shatner was a handsome man."

And yes, my Dad is straight. He's just secure enough to make offhand remarks like this. And I agreed with him. I told him now, as I couldn't as a teenager, that I'd had a crush on the young Captain Kirk.

Amazing how there was NO WAY I ever would've said that to my Dad when I was 13. You can't talk to your fricking Dad at that age about anything to do with boys.

But now - why not? He's my friend as well as my Dad. Lucky me.

Proof!

My brilliant writer buddy and critique partner Elisa Nader took this screenshot of the announcement of my book deal in Publisher's Marketplace.  (It's a bit small here. You can click on it if you actually want to be able to read it.) The site requires a subscription to see stuff, so a screenshot is the only way for the outside world to see proof.

As my friend Diane said, they published that I'm going to be published.

Which means it's all real.

Incroyable!

I Have a Book Deal!

I can now officially announce the BIG NEWS.

I have a two-book deal with Kensington Books with their K Teen imprint.  Let the dancing commence!



The books are part 1 and part 2 of a YA paranormal series. The title of Book 1 is currently OTHERKIN (subject to publisher approval), and it'll be out August or November next year.

All hail my agent, Tamar Rydzinski at Laura Dail Literary!

All hail Kensington Books' K Teen imprint for saying they love my book!

Still so much to do. But I had to share.  Life is sweet.

The Beauty of the Book

Borders Bookstore chain is closing.  Over ten thousand people are losing their jobs, publishers are taking a huge hit as Borders fails to pay them money it owes, authors' print runs are shrinking (see a great NPR article here with the deets), but for me it's another sign of the death of the beauty of the book.

Reading will survive, of course. Books will continue to be written and read, perhaps even in greater numbers, as ebooks take over and almost all sales eventually shift to one electronic form or another.  That's the most important thing, I suppose.  (Well, the lives the Borders employees affected by this are probably the most important thing, really. But you see where I'm going.)

But I can remember going into Tower Records and holding my first Beatles LP in my hands. It sent a visceral thrill through me that downloading an mp3 on ITunes simply cannot duplicate.  The music was tangible, real, in my hands. The cover (it was Live at the Hollywood Bowl) had what looked like actual tickets to the concert on it.  I could imagine holding those tickets in my sweaty little hand as I joined my screams with the other girls at the concert.

Getting a page to print up with an electronic ticket in my email for concerts today does not generate that excitement.  Burning my own cds or watching files download from MySpace sites after I buy a file does not make my toes vibrate with love and passion the way holding this album cover did.

So it goes with books.  I still have some of my first books - the Oxford Book of Nursery Rhymes, Now We are Six by A.A. Milne.  I wrote in those books. I circled words I liked and tried to spell out my name on the inside cover. I can still see my four year old scrawl and my five year old comments in these books.  When I hold them now I remember with sudden swift vividness how it felt to recite "Bad King John" with my Dad as he held the book in front of me.

Kids can't circle words on their iPads today. Or if they do, the circles don't stay.  When they get older they won't see the wear and tear of the years on the "pages" of their Kindle editions, or remember how they smeared chocolate on the blank back pages of their Nook while they read House at Pooh Corner. 

And the smell of a new book!  The ivory gleam of pages ruffling through your fingers as you estimated how much further till Nancy Drew unraveled the Mystery of the Old Clock.  To enter a bookstore was to enter a cathedral of story.  To touch the spines of those books was to come into contact with a hundred new ideas, a thousand new adventures.  If you saw another kid eagerly reading a pink book with an octopus on the cover, you could hunt for that book yourself by spotting that distinctive shade of magenta on the shelf.  You can't do that by looking at the back of an iPad.

But Borders is closing.  And printed books are a dying breed.  A few afficionados will remain, and a few bookstores will live on by catering to collectors, the same way vinyl records still sell a few copies to those who want a multi-level experience when buying music.

This to me is a tragedy.  Reading will  live on, thank goodness.  But the visceral connection to the word will die.  Maybe it means more people will read books, and that is something to celebrate.  But I'm in mourning for the "real" book.  And for all those people who lost their jobs.

Updated to add: Just to be clear - I'm pro-ebook, pro-Kindle, Nook, e-reader, etc. Reading is fabulous, regardless of the means.  I just wish the rise of one method didn't have to mean the death of the other. 

Maybe It Once Kissed A Pomegranate

Life has been a bit nutty lately in ways that I can't blog about because it all involves other people whose privacy I will not violate.

But I am sorry I haven't blogged much lately.  I feel like my writing is finally starting to go somewhere, then I don't have enough time, or sometimes, enough energy to blog/tweet/Facebook to share stuff with people and move forward on it.  Oh well.  Plenty of time ahead left for self marketing, right?  Sometimes you just have to deal with what's right in front of you.

Then a story like this one on Yahoo News catches my eye, and my imagination runs riot.  That's how it works for me. An archaeologist finds a tiny golden bell that once adorned someone's robe in a sewer in Old Jerusalem, and my imagination takes over.

Whose robe once tinkled with this bell?  A priest in a holy procession?  A wealthy woman on her way to see her lover?  Did the owner of this bell realize the moment when it was lost, when it fell from the robe and bounced into the sewer? Did Jewish rebels, using those sewers to flee Roman legions while their beloved city and temple were razed back in 70 AD sneak past where that golden bell lay in the muck?  Did a rat once mistake it for food down there?  The Bible describes priestly garments being adorned with such bells, hanging between decorative pomegranates. Does this bell remember the pomegranate it once kissed? If it could speak, could we hear the ancient sermons it listened to?

This is why I love archaeology and history.  It makes me think about the people of those times - about their losses and loves, their tragedies and transcendent moments.  It's been a rough week or year or decade for the world. Madmen take the lives of innocents, children starve while politicians create unnecessary roadblocks to progress, temperatures rise, polar bears can't swim far enough, self hatred leads to self destruction, illness strikes, and frightened people hurt others because they know no other way.

In the past this all happened too. They were people like us (okay, maybe with worse teeth and shorter lifespans), and their stories are now gone, except for hints like this little golden bell. It's left to us to imagine and remember.

The Book I've Waited For

It's not often I go to the bookstore the day a book is released especially to get it. But I did it today for George R.R. Martin's A Dance With Dragons.  Ohohoho! You betcha.

I don't think I've done that since the previous book in this series, A Feast For Crows, came out. That was November 8, 2005.  I waited nearly six years for Dragons.  People asked me if I'd wait to buy it so I could get it when George R.R. Martin (the author) is in town at the end of the month, signing books.

Wait two more weeks?  Hell, no.  I might go see Martin at the signing, but no way I'm waiting till then to read his book.

People asked me if I'd wait to get it in paperback.

Wait MONTHS???  Eff that and eff you. You don't get it.

It's not very often I get all passionate and crazy about anything.  I did it more often as a teenager, of course.  But I was never the sort to stand in long lines for things or to get autographs or to collect stuff.

So when I stand in line, when I rush to buy, when I go the extra mile to get/read/watch/meet/listen to something or someone, you know I love it with every fiber of my little soul.

Which is why I didn't buy this on Kindle, despite its enormous size.  Reading a book this fat on a Kindle would be much easier on the hands and arms.  But some books you need to be able to touch, to pour over the maps, to sniff the paper and the glue and feel the embossing on the caver.  All that, plus the amazingly good writing, pull me completely into another world.

And this way I can lend it out when I'm done.  That's what I did with the earlier books in the series. And I converted a bunch of folks in the process. 

Don't get me wrong - read this on a Kindle or Nook or whatever you like.  I don't care.  I prefer the hard copy.  But if you like fantasy at all, just read it.  Well, read the first one Game of Thrones first.

And if that's not your cup of tea, then find something you love and run your hands over its embossing.  A little passion is good for the little soul.