Good morning, Readers!

Well, I finally decided on a time and date for the book launch party for The Winter Wolf.  Thanks to my friend J.D. for her suggestion.  It made so much sense I almost wanted to hit myself for not thinking of it.

A book launch, if you're unaware, is really just an excuse for an event with awesome people.  It's a celebration of a work complete; a party to thank the gods of art and literature that you no longer have to be working on that frakking manuscript any more!

At least that's how I see it.

A lot of people often don't want to come to such an event because they feel as if they ought to buy the book being celebrated and they may not have the money or even be all that interested in owning a copy.  For the record, you don't have to buy the book at all.  Usually, authors are just looking for some support from their community.

For myself, I'd love to see you there whether or not you buy a copy.  It's nice to know that people care about your achievements and want to celebrate with you.

So that's all this book launch is.  It's a great big celebration to say farewell to what amounts to four years of working on The Seraphimé Saga.  Actually, now that I've written it down, it's sort of bitter-sweet.  I've come to care for Seraphimé a fair amount.  And Bran.  And Ur.  It's going to be strange not having these people in my life any more.

Characters are people too!

Anyway, I would very much love it if you came to my little party.  I've created a Facebook event for it.  So if you're on Facebook and would like to RSVP, you can do so here.  If you're not on Facebook, the party will be held November 2nd at the Royal Oak, 161 Laurier Ave. E (near the University of Ottawa) in the basement.  This particular location has a really cool little basement that is perfect for this kind of event.

So... that is all.

For the record, I'm shrieking with delight internally.  Imagine an eight year old girl who has just been told she'll be getting a pony.  That's what it's like inside my head right now.

Right, onto today's Welsh lesson.  I'm going to attempt lesson five.  Hah!

Ciao!

Good morning, Readers!

Phew!  I've had a busy weekend.

Friday evening saw me so exhausted from the week that I went home and crashed.  I collapsed on my bed and slept for a couple of hours before dragging myself from slumber to edit the first of the ChiSeries readings.  You can watch it HERE if you want.  It's a great, quite sad tale called Dracula Must Die by talented Torontonian author David Nickle.

Speaking of video editing, yesterday was the charity screening of Joss Whedon's Serenity at the Mayfair Theatre here in Ottawa.  Thanks to the Ottawa Browncoats for organising the event.  This does have something to do with video editing.  Stay with me.  Tom of same said organisation helps out a lot with the Silver Stag Entertainment YouTube channel I run, and he asked me to pull together a trailer for the video podcast that goes up every week on the channel.  Not knowing how to capture the spirit of the show, it took me forever to edit together something even remotely decent.  I managed it, though - I hope - and I sent it off to him.  It aired last night during the screening.

I was saving it to show the world until after the initial screening.  I heard tell that it made people laugh, which is what I was going for.  In case you're curious, here is the trailer:

But back to this weekend.  Saturday was spent at a friend's wedding.  It was a beautiful afternoon for it, if a little unseasonably warm.  The location was stunning, with lakes and fountains and the changing colours of autumn.  Sigh.  It really was lovely.  I might also add, that I went not expecting to cry and ended up tearing up quite a bit.

In any case, my most hearty congratulations to the happy couple.  I hope there are many more years of joy ahead of you both.

Sunday, I had a meeting with Rob Olsen of Geek Inked Magazine.  It was more of a friendly get together thing, but it did involve work, so I'm calling it a meeting.  Then I headed over to Patty Boland's Irish Pub and waited for the rest of the Nights at the Round Table crew to arrive to film.  In between the video editing, the wedding, the filming and the meeting, I had to somehow read a book (thank goodness it was short), watch a movie, fix the formatting errors found when I uploaded The Winter Wolf to Smashwords for pre-order and try and get started organising my book launch party.

It was busy weekend.

On the bright side, I managed to read to book and watch the movie.  They were filmed for Nights at the Round Table yesterday, and the book panel should be live right on time tonight.  Even better, I think all the formatting issues have been fixed.  The book should be available for pre-order via various retailers soon.

If you really want to pre-order the eBook for your Kindle, that is already available HERE.

And pre-ordering for the paperback edition is also an option.  If you want.  You can do that HERE.

I'm not much closer to getting my launch party organised, though.  The book is due out Hallowe'en.  In relative time, that's actually quite soon.  I have made it a habit to have the launch the weekend after.  This time, however, the weekend after Hallowe'en is close enough to the actual date that I fear I'll be clashing with other functions... which would make me sad.  I'm currently conflicted.  Should I hold it the Saturday, and risk the other parties that are sure to be happening and thus have people not attend?  Or do I do the same on Sunday, and risk people not attend because it's Sunday?

I'm actually leaning towards Sunday, though OC Transpo's idiotic weekend scheduling would make it difficult for those without a car.  I figure I wouldn't be disturbing too many parties on Sunday and if we end it fairly early on Sunday, then people wouldn't be stuck waiting for buses for ages.

What do you think, readers?

Right, I have to get back to my Welsh lessons, and then to writing.

Ciao!

Good morning, readers!

At long last, the final schedule for this year's Can-Con, Canada's homegrown speculative fiction convention, has been released into the wild (read here: the internet).

I am very busy this convention!  Last year I sat on perhaps two panels and also did a reading.  This year, I am on five panels, as well as on a live recording of an episode of Nights at the Round Table for Silver Stag Entertainment and I'm also doing a reading for The Winter Wolf.

Holy panels, Batman!

I'm actually super stoked about it.  This will be my third year at Can-Con, and I have never not had a blast.  The panels are usually great, and everyone is almost always wonderful.  In case you are intensely curious or feel like stalking me, all of my appearances are listed below (and you can always come and visit me in the dealer's room, because it's the place where all the cool kids hang out):

Friday, 3 Oct, 2014

Panel: The Past, Present and Future of Fandom
Time: 8:00pm
Location: Room 2

Saturday, 4 Oct, 2014

Panel: The Economics of Self-Publishing
Time: 10:00am
Location: Room 3

Reading: Excerpt from The Winter Wolf
Time: 11:00am
Location: Room 5

Panel: Multimedia Fandom
Time: 6:00pm
Location: Room 1

Panel: Email Spam: Can a Narrative be Created? (Silliness may ensue)
Time: 7:00pm
Location: Room 3

Sunday, 5 Oct, 2014

Special Live Recording of Nights at the Round Table
Time: 12:00pm
Location: Room 5

Panel: Talking About Your Sonic Wrench and Other Tricks for Flushing Out the Nerds Who Are Hiding As Muggles
Time: 1:00pm
Location: Room 2

So there we have it.  I'm very busy and very pleased about it.  The problem, of course, is that I won't be at my table in the dealer's room very frequently.  This may prove to be a problem this year, as the Amazing Flatmate has an amazing job and will be working all of Sunday.  I shall have to figure something out.  Le sigh!

Of course, though I am partial to the panels I'm on, they aren't the only panels on offer.  Click HERE to see them all, and decide which you must attend.  There are so many great panels.  I wish I could get my hands on a time-turner and go to them all.

Le sigh.

By the by, do come to Can-Con.  It is almost always a spectacular time.  I was so intimidated my first year at Can-Con, but everyone proved so wonderful that now it is one of my favourite places to be.

Hope to see you there!

Ciao!

Good morning, Readers!

Well, there really isn't anything to write about today.  There has been nothing I've read or heard between yesterday's post and today's that has made me angry enough to rant about in a public forum.  I'm almost upset about that fact alone, as, thus far, yesterday's rant has been my most popular blog post to date.  Thanks everyone who took the time to share it and comment on it.

If you're in the mood to listen to a rant, there this particularly good one by author Chuck Wendig about the whole naked photo leak that happened recently.  He's a sane voice against all the bullshit I've heard surrounding this story.  He also swears a lot, so it's almost like reading one of my rants.

Since there really isn't anything that I specifically wanted to talk about, I'm just going to fill you in on some things that are happening near me that you might want to attend.  They're all awesome things, I promise.

First up, fellow author, spoken performance artist and all 'round wonderful person Marie Bilodeau is performing in town.  They will be telling stories of the dangers of the sea.  She is performing Tuesday September 9th and Friday October 10th.  I will be going to the October performance.  You can read more details about it on her blog here.

Next up is the Chiaroscuro Reading Series.  This is an awesome series that promotes Canadian speculative fiction.  You show up, grab a seat, order a drink (or several) and sit down for a great couple of hours of stories and fun.  It is genuinely a quality event, and I will always go.  I even skip training to attend; it's that good.  If you think you can handle the awesome, you can find details of the September 23rd Ottawa event on their website and on Facebook.

Finally, because three is a magic number, there is Can Con.  This wonderful convention is for writers and readers of Canadian speculative fiction.  It has a long and wonderful history, and I have attended two years running.  This will be my third.  Yes.  I will be there.  Yes.  I will have a table there to sell my work.  I will also be reading from The Winter Wolf (eep!) and may appear on a panel or two.  So far I'm aware of only one that I'm on.  It hasn't all been set in stone, however.  Registration for this is now open.  It's very open.  And you should really come out.  There are great workshops, fantastic panels, the dealer's room is awesome (if I do say so myself) and it's just a fun place for people who write and those who love to read that writing.  Check it out.  This is their website.

Alright.  Well, this has been your Thursday P.S.A.

Oh, wait!  There's one more.  My latest obsession, The Quest, is having two back to back episodes tonight, and I'm excited.  That is all.  You may return to your day.

Ciao!