Dwelling in Probabilities - C. Lundoff's Journal

2012's upcoming readings, cons, interviews and what not (in progress--I'll add to this/change the list as more things turn up).

January:
        "Do's and Don'ts of Author Self-Promotion" - January 5th. Guest blog post on Morgen Bailey's writing blog.
        Lesbian Fiction Appreciation Event. Jan 7 -Jan 21. I did a guest post on host author K.T. Grant's blog on lesbian characters in sf/f.

February:
         "Lavender Ink: Writing and Selling LGBTQ Fiction" - February 18th, 9-noon, The Loft Literary Center. Workshop on writing and selling queer fiction.
          "Readings Goes to the Wolves" - February 18th, 4PM Eastern. Readings in Lesbian & Bisexual Women's Fiction Blogtalk Radio Show with host Lara Zielinsky and guests Naomi Clark, Nene Adams, Meghan O'Brien, Allison Moon and me talking about lesbian and bi werewolves.
             "Love Stinks: Writing Dysfunctional Relationships" - February 26th, 1:30-2:30, MinnSpec Writers Meetup, Uptown Lunds Community Room. Panel discussion with Rebecca Chesin, Sherry Merriam, Lyda Morehouse and me.

March:
        Marscon - March 9-11, Minneapolis, MN. I'll be doing local writer guest type things here, which in this case includes panels and a Broad Universe Rapidfire Reading.
        Speculations Reading Series - March 14th, 6:30-7:30PM, DreamHaven Books, Comics and Art, Minneapolis.
        Women's Reading Event - March 18th, 1-4PM, Quatrefoil Library, St. Paul. I'll be reading at the annual women's month reading, along with other local authors.

April:

May:
       Guest blog/interview on author Tracey S. Morris' blog.
       As You Were: Metal, Mayhem, Monsters - May 16, author interview for Werewolf Wednesday.
       Women and Children First Bookstore Sappho's Salon author reading - May 19th, Chicago, IL.
       Outwords Books, Gifts and Coffee, Milwaukee, WI. May 22, 7PM. Author reading.
       Whatever: The Big Idea, everywhere. May 24th. Guest blog.
        WisCon - May 25 -28, Madison, WI. Release for Silver Moon, my debut novel, at the Outer Alliance Party, plus a panel/discussion on Feminist/Outsider Cyberpunk and a reading, also with Outer Alliance.

June:
        Skiffy and Fanty Podcast - In which I talk about werewolves and Silver Moon and related stuff with hosts Shaun Duke and Jen Zink.
        Broadpod podcast - Pride Month Broad Universe podcast reading featuring Jennifer Pelland, K.T. Pinto, Julia Rios, Trisha Woolridge, Sarah Ettrich and me.
        Golden Crown Literary Conference - June 13th - 17th, Minneapolis, MN. Conference for lesbian fiction - workshops, readings and awards. I'll be moderating a panel on were creatures and shapeshifters.
         Pride Week Book Release Reading with Catherine Lundoff and Jessie Chandler - June 21st, 7:30PM. Magers and Quinn Booksellers. Mystery author Jessie Chandler will be joining me to read from her new book Hide and Snake Murder.

July:
       Broadpod podcast - Alternate History Broad Universe podcast reading featuring Jean Marie Ward, Kelly A. Harmon, Kathryn Hinds, Kathryn Villyard and me.
      CONvergence - July 5-8, Minneapolis, MN. Panels.
       #FeministSF Twitterchat - July 15th. Aging in Feminist SF and F.

August:
        Diversicon - August 3-5, St. Paul, MN. Reading and panels
       Worldcon - August 30th -September 3rd, Chicago, IL. Panels.

September:
     
October:
        Gaylaxicon 2012 - October 5th-7th, Minneapolis, MN. The conference for queer fandom. I'll be doing something in the way of programming.
        Twin Cities Book Festival - TBD

November:
         
December:
        

is pure awesome. And shows every sign of continuing that way. We got in on Thursday morning and got settled in. I went to the reception at A Room of One's Own and ran into a number of folks I haven't seen in ages. Andrea Hairston, Pan Morrigan and Debbie Notkin all did interesting readings/performances. Lots of good stuff there. After the readings, I met up with Outer Alliance organizer extraordinaire Julia Rios and her partner Moss and went back to hang out in the Concourse Bar. We planned for the party until Betsy Lundsten stopped by to fetch me for consultations on clothing and related fun stuff. :-)

Saturday morning was shopping with Jana, Julia and Moss for the Outer Alliance Party, which went well and quickly. Then it off to Myles Teddyweggers for the annual Cornish pasty consumption. Then back to the Concourse to meet up with Rebecca, S.N. Arly and other friends. Dinner was yummy Nepalese food, then back to the hotel for party prep. After a slightly slow start, a number of folks stopped by to help (huge thank you!) and we got it all decorated and set up. I set up my books and autographing station and we were off! The party was really lively and quite crowded most of the time. There seemed to be lots of good discussion (I know I had several) and we talked to a lot of of folks about OA. Several friends stopped by to say hi and in some cases, to buy books. A number of complete strangers walked in, pointed to the book and said, "Hey, that's the Big Idea Book!" and bought it. My personal fav was the woman who asked me to sign the book but not personalize it because she would "personalize it." She then spent the next ten minutes drawing a sketch of me on the title page! It was quite good, too. :-) I got to see lots of old friends, make some new friends, sold a bunch of books, mine and other folks, and generally had a blast. Thanks, Julia, Jana, Moss, Brackett, Sheila, Autumn and everyone else who did set up and party maintenance as well as everyone who stopped by. Best. Release. Party. Ever.

Except for the whole not sleeping thing. But hey, lots of caffeine later and I've done my cyberpunk panel (well attended, good discussion and my panelist did a great job). Now we're off to dinner, then back for the auction and the Outer Alliance Reading at 10:30PM. And I have new Wraptillion earrings from the art show. Bliss!

At Whatever - http://whatever.scalzi.com/author/scalzi/

It's been really interesting to do so many guest blogs about "Silver Moon" back-to-back like this. I'm having to think a lot more about my writing process and how to explain it to other people than I've ever had to do before. I think that in the next week or so, I'll try and come up with a coherent post on the good and bad sides of that, but for now, yay, Big Idea! :-D

And we are safely arrived at The Concourse. WisCon coming up.

To kick off #werewolfwednesday, werewolf blogger extraordinaire David Jon Fuller interviews me at his blog As You Were: Metal, Monsters, Mayhem ( I just love saying that).

Last night's reading at Outwords Books was fun - another small, but enthusiastic audience. People have been buying Silver Moon, for which I am wildly grateful, but it would be nice to see a few more faces at the readings. Outwords is a terrific store - and they now have signed copies of Silver Moon in stock, so if you couldn't make it last night but want to get a copy, please make Carl's day and pick one up over there. I'm quite jealous that Milwaukee and Chicago still have great LGBTQ bookstores and the Twin Cities no longer does.

Took a stroll down to the lake yesterday and wandered by the Milwaukee Art Museum, which was delightful. Today's expedition will be some bookstores downtown and tea at Watt's Tea Shop, as soon as we get it together. The weather's been lovely, the County Clare is charming, and breakfast at The Eatery on Farwell was excellent (huge thanks to our house/cat sitters who make it all possible). Tomorrow, it's off to Madison for the joys of WisCon. Huzzah!

Update on the Amazon situation: I talked to 4 people who preordered and 2 already had their books,1 was told it was being shipped and the other was told she had the option of canceling since they didn't have the book! I tried talking to Amazon directly and they were utterly useless. My publisher has worked out a temporary solution as of this AM so we're hoping there will no more snafus. At any rate, they do apparently have the book, even though they say they don't.

Quick reminder - I'll be reading at Outwords Books in Milwaukee tonight at 7PM. http://www.outwordsbooks.com/
Hope some of you can make it!

Some nifty things I am learning from bookstores regarding print on demand titles and the relative difficulty in obtaining same:
1. Ingram distribution which owns Lightning Source, one of the biggest POD publishers, is no longer offering the standard full discount (40%) on backlist titles. Not sure how new this is, but I just started hearing about it this year. What this means from my perspective is that while Silver Moon can be ordered in (until such time as it becomes a "backlist" title - end of 2012?) through Ingram, it's not cost-effective for bookstores to carry my other books unless they order them directly from Lethe Press.
2. Baker and Taylor was the other distribution option but apparently they are now randomly picking and choosing which books they feel like carrying because they're doing their own POD and are disinclined to carry books by competitors.

Needless to say, this is putting a squeeze on both small presses, many of which use POD and indie bookstores, many of which were surviving on backlist titles that were no longer available at B&N and the other chains. This is also why you'll see some indies suddenly charging more than cover price for titles from the presses which use POD (I'm less than understanding about that practice when they already have the books in stock or when the publisher in question is local to the store and could supply them with books, both of which I've seen within recent memory). 

None of this gives me any idea as to why Amazon.com still has the print edition of Silver Moon listed as "temporarily out of stock" when they are closely linked to Ingram/Lightning Source and the book is available and out on the shelves at Women & Children First Bookstore, Outwords Books, Giovanni's Room, and A Room of One's Own Bookstore, as well as sitting in a largish box in the trunk of my car and on order from IndieBound. If you were kind enough to preorder the book from Amazon and you haven't heard from them, please feel free to contact them and complain that it's available elsewhere since one of the points of preordering is that you'd get the book when it came out, not after everyone else has it. Grumble, growl.

And none of this impacts the ebook editions, now readily available on Kindle, Nook/Smashwords, Bella Distribution, Wizard's Tower Books, and via download from the Lethe Press website. More to come, I suspect.

Now back to prepping for my reading tomorrow night at Outwords Books.

i did my reading at Women & Children First Bookstore in Chicago last night. The city is pretty much under siege between the actual NATO meetings, the protests against the meetings and the overreaction to the protests against the meetings. So the trains and highways through downtown were virtually shutdown. Not surprisingly, attendance took a hit. We read to about 12 people at a regular event that normally draws about 30, but that said, it was a good and appreciative audience. The bookstore is amazing and the staff is terrific - I always love going there. And they have "Silver Moon"'in stock. :-)
I really hope I get to read there again soon.

Now I get a day off with friends, then off to Milwaukee tomorrow.

and I'm off! Note to self: next book, take release week off. So very sick yesterday. Bleak.
Today, I'm feeling better and off to Chicago this afternoon. For Chicago folks, I'll be reading at Women & Children First Bookstore tomorrow night (5/19) at 7:30PM (well to the north of downtown). http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.com/event/sappho’s-salon-7

In the sense of being a supergrainy iPhone photo of a box of books. But it is my book and I am thrilled! :-D

Because Nature abhors a vacuum and all that. But mostly because John Scalzi will be there and I figure that if he's being kind enough to host my book for a Big Idea, the least I can do is stop by when he's in town and say "thanks." I've also been assured that it'll be more fun than the first time I went, though in fairness to the con, I was also quite sick that weekend so that certainly played a big part in how I remember it. At any rate, 4th St. Fantasy, featuring an all-star cast (seriously, check out the Attending list) - http://www.4thstreetfantasy.com/2012/programming/

Apart from that, lovely belated Mayday Parade yesterday - many kudos to Heart of the Beast Puppet Theater for pulling it together not once, but twice, due to weather conditions. I'm packing for the big trip (Chicago, Milwaukee and Madison - yes, there will be people at our house so burglars need not take note), and scrambling to get both my Big Idea and a new interview out the door. Lively days ahead!