Into that world inverted...

Happy December, you guys. In case you're wondering, it is me, the artist formerly known as mistful, speaking. Credit for thinking up the new livejournal name goes to the Best Friend, Chiara, and credit for the awesome new layout goes to the brilliant gossymer. Hope you all like it!

So yesterday I was out with my friend Sinéad, seeing the movie Twilight. (Warning for vampire fans - Sinéad is not sympathetic to the plight of vampires in love. She is heartless: it's a character flaw.)

Which reminded me of something else Twilight-related. For those of us unfamiliar: the Twilight saga is a gigantically bestselling series of books about a young girl beloved by a vampire and a werewolf.

This summer I was wandering with my friends through a bookshop in Massachussetts, indulging in an orgy of book buying. I passed by a big stand of the Twilight series, looped with ribbons and adorned with badges, and paused to admire the great beauty of the covers. Then I saw 'Team Edward' and 'Team Jacob' badges strategically positioned on the stand.

SARAH: Teams? I do not understand. In the next book will Edward and Jacob play baseball against each other? Is there going to be a dance-off?
HOLLY (patiently): No, it means some people like one guy, and some people like the other guy.
SARAH: ... Hmm.

I thought about this, and decided it was sheer marketing genius. This is because I like picking sides. I get all passionate about my favourite characters, and I am extremely competitive. No, extremely: as a child I worked out a system for winning at Pass the Parcel that would totally have worked if my mother had been more co-operative, and my house at school was pretty infamous for cheating on Sports Day.

I think lots of people do this - pick sides, that is, not cheat at Pass the Parcel, for that you have to be born with a criminal mind. One of the reasons people went for Harry Potter, another mega bestselling series you may have heard of, was because you had the sides arranged for you: people could think of themselves as aligned with the different houses and cheer for them to win cups. People can get into heated debates about which character/relationship/side/TEAM is best and of course, if one team wins, the other has to lose, so tempers can run high.

Of course, as is my way, I immediately began to take this too far and apply it to everything. A little while later, while rambling around New York with my friends Jen and Sarah Cross, I explained how Teams worked in Wuthering Heights.

JEN: They don't work in Wuthering Heights.
SARAH: Sure they do! Sure they do! It's Team Heathcliff versus Team Edgar Linton!
SARAH C: Sarah, nobody is on Team Edgar Linton.
SARAH: I AM ON TEAM EDGAR LINTON. He's hot and blond and rich and he doesn't hang puppies! He's clearly the team to be on. Everyone should be on Team Doesn't Hang Puppies!

They seemed unconvinced, which I think is very unfair. And cruel to animals. For the record, if Heathcliff and Edgar Linton had a dance-off on the moors, I believe Edgar Linton would win!

So is anyone else on Team Edgar Linton, or a lonely supporter of some other fictional character or relationship others don't like? Does being on Team Someone make you like a book or a TV show more? Is it human nature to like teams, or are there lots of people on Team No Teams, Please?

So I just realised I never talk about television here. Which is odd, because I love television.

I do not love it in the way most people love it, I don’t think. I have never channel surfed in my life, since that would eat my writing time like a whale gently inhaling plankton. And I see it as a social activity: if I’m on my own, I’ll read a book. I tend to watch what my friends watch. When I lived in New York, I watched medical dramas with my flatmate and Veronica Mars with my friends. When I lived in England, I watched Japanese dramas with Penelope.

So speaking of Penelope, I was in London last week attending a bookseller dinner, where I met many awesome people and gave them knives (I’ll explain that in another post…) and the next day I went out to lunch with my fair ex-flatmate and we spoke of many things, and she recommended a new show she was watching called Merlin. Previously I had heard about it and decided not to watch it, because I thought that Merlin’s early years would be kind of dull, and also that it would not get Arthurian mythology even slightly right.

I was extremely correct about one of those two things.

Trusting as a little child, on my return to Ireland I settled down to try out Merlin. In which Merlin is younger than Arthur, Guinevere is a blacksmith’s daughter who is in love with Merlin, Morgan le Fay and Arthur seem to be the chief romantic pairing and anyone who has ever known anything about Arthurian legends knows we are living in opposites land.

( MERLIN: The Legend of the Once and Future Prat )

So… Merlin. It’s bizarre, and charming, and interesting, and I have no idea where it’s going! Which, considering Arthurian legends, is quite something.

What new TV thing are you trying out?

Just now I am so frantically busy that I feel like a hamster in a messy ponytail, running in her little plastic ball, trying to get to her fainting couch. The plastic ball keeps bouncing off the fainting couch: the hamster keeps running.

Nobody wants to hear about the adventures of the sad hamster.

So instead I decided to write you all some more book reviews. The last ones were received well, so I shall keep the same style, warning for incoherence and inaccurate acting out of scenes as I go!

How to Ditch Your Fairy by Justine Larbalestier

In New Avalon, an imaginary place that may resemble a slightly-futuristic blend of New York and Sydney, everyone has an invisible fairy. Some people have a clothes-shopping fairy, a get-out-of-trouble fairy, an all-the-boys-like-you fairy. Most of the celebrities have a charisma fairy.

Charlie has a parking fairy. She keeps getting loaned out to the neighbours and kidnapped by the local bully so they can find awesome parking spots. So she's on a mission to ditch her fairy, armed with the slightly-stolen Ultimate Fairy Book and helped out by the last person she would ever have thought might want to ditch their fairy, too.

My very favourite thing about this book is the language, which is an Australian-American and believably futuristic blend of slang: 'spoffs' is my new favourite word, and I plan to use it all the time.

( How To Ditch Your Fairy by Justine Larbalestier, spoilers and reservations )

Wicked Gentlemen by Ginn Hale

Since a lot of the books I've been recommending lately are young adult fantasy, as, well, that is what I best like to read: warning, warning, Wicked Gentlemen is very adult indeed. Explicit scenes! May be offensive to the religious!

Wicked Gentlemen is a noir detective novel set in an alternate world: a place very like Victorian London, except that a few hundred years ago the devils were all redeemed from hell, got baptised, and came up to live with the humans so they could all be happy ever after in unity and peace.

That worked about as well as you might expect. Now the Prodigals (the devils' descendants), who have yellow eyes and black nails and are a bit conspicuous, live in a ghetto formerly known as Hopetown and now known as Hells Below. Yeah - that about sums it up.

Belimai Sykes, Prodigal and private detective (among other things) has been having a pretty bad seven years, and then a captain of the Inquisition shows up on his doorstep and demands help with a missing girl.

So it's sort of like Sherlock Holmes meets The Master and Margarita. If Sherlock Holmes was, uh, descended from devils, which gives the police rather an edge.

POLICE: Your behaviour is erratic, sir!
BELIMAI: Yours is unimaginative.
POLICE: Taboo!
BELIMAI: Totally boring!
POLICE: Corrupt!
BELIMAI: Right back at you!
POLICE: Spawn of Satan!
BELIMAI: ... Well, you have me there.

( Wicked Gentlemen by Ginn Hale, spoilers and reservations )

A heads-up to you all: in a week or so, the name of this livejournal is going to change to well, something with 'sarah' in it, anyway. Sadly 'sarahreesbrennan' is one letter too long for livejournal. Oh, livejournal. Why do you have to hurt me like this, baby? Any good ideas, let me know!

For the sake of the day that's in it, and because this is a wonderful week.

Since the pro-cookie poll results were quite decisive, I am putting the cookies up here: I tried linking to myspace or facebook, but this means asking people to log in, and I did not wish anyone to find me and slap me about the face with a halibut for making their lives difficult. Those who wish to resist temptation: um, resist! I support you in your decision!

Also if anyone would like to get emails with regular updates, subscribe here!

For the first cookie I took a look at the poll on my lovely marmalade_fish and tried to pick something people would like. ;)

( Cookie Number One )

And uh, I might add with some excitement, I am now available on Amazon!

I must apologise before I even get started. I am afraid this post is going to make even less sense than usual.

One reason for the madness is that today is the day of the American presidential elections. Well, I am not American, and I do not have a vote, and I have my own president. (She's very nice.) So I do not wish to air political views to people who have much more reason to be concerned than me. But I am very fond of America and several Americans in particular, plus really, what concerns America concerns the world. So tonight, and until the wee hours of the morning, I will be glued to the telly. We're having a little Indian Takeaway Election Party, which seemed like a good idea before my flatmates remembered how over-excited I tend to get, and how the Durham Lass sometimes renders herself what she refers to as 'kormatose.'

The party may well play out like this:

SARAH: Yes! Nooooo. Yes! Yay! Oh, sugar butties! (I am always careful not to use strong language during events in which I wish for fate to be merciful. Just in case.)
CHIARA: Maybe you need to calm down.
SARAH: flings cheese naan wildly: it ricochets like a boomerang and strikes Chiara
JENNET: ... Please do not assault people with food products in our home.
DURHAM LASS: Especially not guests. It is unmannerly.

(And if you're wondering who I am hoping will win - well, again, not my country, I do not want to push my views on anyone: but I belong to this group.)

Another reason for the madness is that this is National Novel Writing Month. Well, I am not writing a novel this month, as my task for this month is to make book two of The Demon's Lexicon series fit for the eyes of anyone who is not me. Still, inspired by the effort I know others are putting in, I have made this National Novel Revising Month for me and am determined to be done by December 1st. So I am hard at work.

The way I saw things months ago: I was not quite sure what the final product of the first book would look like, so I reasonably skipped scenes, left some spaces, and on re-reads made a few helpful notes for myself.

The way I see things now: Clearly possessed by a demon, I have written in my sleep awful messages to torment my innocent waking self.

PRESENT SARAH: And now to read back over that excellent scene I wrote a while back.
PRESENT SARAH: Scene's not there. Surely I did not just think out scene. Surely I wrote something!
PAST SARAH: Write scene. Make good.

PRESENT SARAH: Ah well, at least I wrote this scene, and if I do say so myself it's rather-
PAST SARAH: Rewrite scene. Make better. Terrible now.

Past Sarah has dotted several more interesting observations along the way, like 'Insert that subplot' and 'Acquire superpowers.' I think she thinks she's funny. She is not.

Things that soothe the madness: the awesome responses to my cover and first chapter. Thanks, you guys! And especially thanks for the very first piece of fanart that is all my own, and BEAUTIFUL!

As it is a while until June, I was thinking of putting up a cookie (a tiny snippet of the book) up every month, and thus, this poll.

( Cookies, Yes or No? The Poll )

So I was eating pancakes with a friend, and this conversation happened.

SARAH: Then someone asked me who my favourite fictional character was.
FRIEND: Who did you say?
SARAH: Well, it's hard to choose, but I think Elizabeth Bennet.
FRIEND: Elizabeth Bennet? But she's a girl!

The thing is, that didn't surprise me. I've heard, a lot of times, things like 'I don't like girl characters as much,' 'They're not as interesting,' and so on. And sometimes? These complaints are totally valid.

And why is that?

( Ladies, Please! - Looking at and Looking for Girls in Fiction )

SIMON&SCHUSTER LAST WEEK: Here's your final cover.
SARAH: Oh, wow, thank you! I shall treasure it and keep it secret. I will be stealthy like a ninja!
SIMON&SCHUSTER YESTERDAY: Hey, you can share your cover!
SARAH: So soon? Brilliant! I will wait a bit since I just put up my first chapter, and I do not want people to be sick of me.
PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET: Hey, your cover's on SimonSays.
SARAH: Simon&Schuster are super brilliant, but they are not like ninjas at all.

So, um, I hope you guys enjoy! I wish I could make it bigger, since I love it best all giant and dominating my desktop, but I know not how.

( The US Cover for The Demon's Lexicon )

EDITED TO ADD:

( Full Jacket for the US Cover )

So the other day I was having a bit of a woe day, wandering around mmunching on an angst muffin, when I checked the computer and total awesomeness fell from the sky!

I cannot believe how kind people are to me, nor how beautiful the shop is.

Especially since nobody has read any of the book.

This is about to change, however. For here is chapter one up online for, uh, with luck your reading pleasure.

The Demon's Lexicon, Chapter One: Ravens in the Kitchen

I hope you guys like it! marmalade_fish is there for any people who would like to discuss how I was clearly eating dishwasher powder again on page 4, or I would be most delighted to hear what you think.

I was sitting in Chat'n'Chew in New York waving about a forkful of exotic, mysterious mac and cheese, and telling my friends Jen Barnes and Sarah Cross about a book I'd read, and they told me I should review books the same way I tell people about them. Which is usually with gushing, grumbling and sometimes entirely inaccurate acting out of scenes.

So I decided to try that out. Therefore, the fact these reviews may be completely incoherent is in no way my fault but directly attributable to Evil Influences.

With that in mind, then, three books I have read, loved and talked about in the last four months...

The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong

I was in London at my friend Ki's house, and she told me to read Dime Store Magic by Kelley Armstrong. I'd already read Bitten by Kelley Armstrong and it hadn't worked for me, but Ki insisted I would like Dime Store Magic. I really liked it, so when I saw Kelley Armstrong's first young adult fantasy book I leaped for it.

Chloe's crazy: she sees and hears people who aren't there, so she's in a home for disturbed adolescents. There are two brothers in the home with her, Gorgeous Lovely Simon and Hideous Derek, and they seem to be suggesting she's a necromancer.

Well, they're obviously very disturbed. The fact they're in the home with her is Chloe's first clue, though Hideous Derek creeping creepily up on her at every opportunity is another hint.

Then her roommate disappears without a trace, Gorgeous Lovely Simon displays some powers of his own, and Chloe raises some zombies in the cellar. She's forced to re-evaluate. (Derek should still quit it with the creepy creeping, though.)

( The Summoning by Kelley Armstrong, spoilers and reservations )

Chalice by Robin McKinley

I will buy anything with Robin McKinley's name on it, because I love her writing: she's one of the writers whose prose I can just sink into, familiar and gorgeous as sinking into a hot bath. That said, I liked Chalice for other reasons than feeling like I could just splash around in her writing with bubbles and a rubber ducky.

Mirasol the beekeeper has just inherited the position of Chalice, which means she acts as right hand for the Master of her land. She's really new and inexperienced, and the last Chalice died with the last Master in very dodgy circumstances. Plus the new Master is a priest of Fire and seems to have mostly turned into a fire element. When he touches Mirasol's hand, he burns her. (Just so we're clear: Not 'hey, baby, you're so fine! Your touch burns me, baby!' but 'hey... baby... your cloak is billowing kind of like your body's made of smoke, your eyes are all red, and - did I say baby, I think I meant sir, or Master, or Lord Terrifying McInhuman, and - OUCH, that's going to scar.')

Humans and monsters interacting, fearing each other and thinking about each other and trying to get on and inching painfully towards understand each other? I love that so much, I will buy any book that seems to be even vaguely about it. Having that in a Robin McKinley book is sort of like having James McAvoy show up at my door saying 'Hi, this was the first door I came to? As you can see, there's been this terrible accident with a vat of melted chocolate in the street - I do apologise for appearing before a lady in this state - I was wondering if possibly this was a situation you could help me with?'

The only answer is yes!

( Chalice by Robin McKinley, spoilers and reservations )

The Magicians and Mrs Quent by Galen Beckett

... Or, as I think of it, the adventures of Elizabeth Eyre and an Effeminate Young Gentlemen About Town.

This is one book about two people, Ivy (Elizabeth Eyre) and Eldyn (Effeminate Young Gentleman) with lives that touch briefly and run alongside, but fairly separate stories. Half of Ivy's story deliberately mirrors Pride and Prejudice and the other half deliberately mirrors Jane Eyre, which is enough to make me love the book all on its own as I love those books and I love the thought of smooshing them together with magic. Eldyn's story does no mirroring, but it does involve saints, actors, cross-dressing and highwaymen.

( The Magicians and Mrs Quent by Galen Beckett, spoilers and reservations )

I am pretty shocking on the phone, you guys. I forget I am talking to a person at all, I just ramble, I say terrible things. It’s even worse with answering machines: my best friend and her family used to keep the messages I left on their answering machine so they could play them back and laugh at me. I always ended with ‘Yours, Sarah’ because I followed eighteenth-century letter writing conventions pretty strictly when I was younger.

These days, I am still shocking on the phone, but I have learned one important thing. I have learned when to hang up.

As for instance, when Gaston called me after I landed in Hawaii.

GASTON: You get there safely?
SARAH: Oh yes. It’s lovely. I can feel the warm breeze caressing me right-
GASTON: Excuse me, who is caressing you?
SARAH: The warm – *pauses to reconsider* - Oh Raoul, you devil, stop that!
SARAH: hangs up

This skill served me well in England. I was there with my friends Cassie and Ruby, trolling the risqué areas of London.

We were researching Cassie’s new series set in Victorian London, naturally. I’m shocked if any of you thought I was doing anything else.

We hit a court where there were Victorian windows and I started merrily snapping pictures of them.

CASSIE: Sarah. Sarahsarahsarah.
SARAH: Such fine specimens!
CASSIE: Yes, speaking of those…
NAKED MAN IN THE WINDOW: fries eggs
SARAH: Oh heavens!
NAKED MAN IN THE WINDOW: makes extremely rude gesture at peeping ladies
CASSIE: Ruby, we have to go, there’s a naked man who seems annoyed with Sarah.
RUBY: Oh, girls. Why does it always have to be like this all the time?
SARAH: … Let’s back away slowly. Okay, now let's back away faster than that.

This led to the following conversation with my father.

FATHER: Sarah, happy birthday!
SARAH: Thank you, Dad!
FATHER: Your sister says to tell you five years until th – I mean, sends her best. So what did you do on your special day?
SARAH: Hit seedy areas of London. Took naked photos.
FATHER: …
SARAH: Got to go. Love you!
SARAH: hangs up

We are dedicated to our research. This may not have been apparent to the poor people of London who saw me wandering around muttering 'We need more burned churches' and 'I'm having a knife fight on the Millennium Bridge.'

I also popped down to Exeter, where my second book is mostly set. I figured it was time to stop calling the tourism people in Exeter, you see. They were starting to seem a bit concerned.

SARAH: Hi, me again. I was wondering about a really rough part of town in Exeter?
PROUD CITIZEN OF EXETER: ... Beg pardon?
SARAH: Could you direct me to somewhere I could beat up some guys, maybe buy some drugs?
PROUD CITIZEN (is not sure the young lady needs any more drugs): Er... Burnt House Lane?
SARAH (types 'Magic on Burnt House Lane' as a chapter title): Thank you so much, I'll buy you a drink when I'm in town!
PROUD CITIZEN: is not sure the young lady needs any more drink either
SARAH: hangs up

Once in Exeter, I wandered around twelfth century ruins, high streets, graveyards and, er… other people’s gardens.

FATHER: Hi darling! How is Exeter?
SARAH: Amazing. I just found Mae and Jamie’s house. I’m in their garden right now.
FATHER: Sarah, you did not. Sarah, listen to me, you found the house of total strangers. You are now trespassing in the garden of total strangers. Do you understand me?
SARAH: … I should leave.
FATHER: Yes, I think that would be a good idea.
SARAH: It’s late. I have to go find some deserted alleyways!
SARAH: hangs up

I was setting a magician's duel in those deserted alleyways, you see. Research is terribly important. Even more important is knowing when to hang up.

Today I got the close-to-final version of the cover of my book, and thus have spent most of the day having tiny seizures of joy and love and doubt and panic. In order to distract myself and not before time, here is the tale of my time this summer in New York.

I have been to New York many times before, but this was the first time I’ve had guests: there was my friend usually referred to (for good reason) in this journal as the Evil One, who was staying with her family in New York State, and there was Gaston, who I do not think I have referred to before and who I have just decided to name after our favourite Disney villain. It should become apparent at this point that I was obviously doomed to be led astray by bad company.

The Evil One, as is her way, immediately put my life in peril. We went out on a raft in Central Park and were immediately caught in a thunderstorm.

SARAH: Ahahaha it’s raining so hard I can’t tell if we’re submerged yet.
EVIL ONE (contemplatively): I like your high-pitched hysterical little giggle. I find it soothing.
PHONE: rings
FATHER: Hello sweetheart! We haven’t talked in a while. How are you?
SARAH: I’m on a boat in the park and the rain is lashing down and there’s thunder and lightning and soon I may die!
FATHER: I’m doing pretty well, myself.
SARAH: … I think this phone might be a lightning rod.
FATHER: Your mother’s also fine. Your little brother has a new type of hair gel, so he’s happy, of course…

Gaston arrived waving his New York Lonely Planet and wearing an unsettling air of determination: he was going to rock New York, it was clear, if it killed me. So we did many things, including taking the Staten Island ferry.

GASTON: Look, the Statue of Liberty!
SARAH: Do you think the Statue of Liberty would be hot if she was a real lady and not a statue?
GASTON: I do not know why it always has to be all about the inappropriate questions all the time. Now, time to get off the ferry!
SARAH: What, why?
GASTON: To see Staten Island.
SARAH: Are we seeing Staten Island?
GASTON: We’re on the Staten Island ferry, aren’t we?
SARAH: You know, if you put it like that it does start to make sense.
GASTON: What was your plan?
SARAH: … Free boat ride! Statues! And dolphins.
GASTON: I haven’t seen any dolphins.
SARAH: Ah, this is because I have not yet sung my song calling to me all the creatures of the deep.
GASTON: Sarah, no singing!
SARAH: I’m getting better at-
GASTON: Sarah, I beg you. SARAH, THERE ARE CHILDREN PRESENT.

We went to Staten Island and found a church whose bells played out several hymns on the hour. I danced to them on a street corner. Gaston regarded me sadly through his spectacles.

One of my favourite activities in New York turns out to be going on firefly hunts. I had never seen fireflies before, and living points of light that will crawl over my skin fascinate me for hours. I like walking through the park at deep dark hours of the night, waiting to stumble upon bright clusters of fireflies in tiny groves, listening to the sound of crickets like tiny ambulances in the trees. Others do not find it as soothing as I.

GASTON: I think crickets are disturbing. And kind of suspicious.
SARAH: You know how we agreed there are certain rare times when you are crazier than I am? This is one of those times.
GASTON: Also, it is very late and very dark. What are we going to do if we are attacked?
SARAH: By who? By the crickets? Honestly, I think you could fight them off.
GASTON: … Not if they are ninja crickets.
SARAH: …
GASTON: You never know with crickets!

I was a bit worried about being a good hostess, because I love New York with all my heart and I wished to show it off to its best advantage. Fortunately, I had help planning these things… and an invitation to an ice-cream crawl.

Just like a pub crawl, except instead of hitting several different pubs you walk around the Village in the sunshine, going to carefully selected gourmet ice-cream parlours on a massive hunt for the best ice-cream in the city, with many trusty partners and spoons at the ready. It’s like a quest. A dessert quest. Everyone should go on ice-cream crawls: you heard it here first.

I also learned that men are never around to protect you from crickets or pirates when you need them. A couple of my writer friends, Jennifer Lynn Barnes and Sarah Cross and I, were sitting in Union Square in the sunshine drinking ice-cool cider and discussing teen werewolves, as one does. Then a strange man, hairy and a little twitchy, came to sit at our picnic table. He eyeballed us. We eyeballed him. We tried to continue our conversation.

SARAH: And so in summary-
TWITCHY: Come wrestle with me in the grass! I promise I’ll let you win.
SARAH (thinking): This is terrible. Jen and Sarah C are delicate and virtuous young ladies. They seem shocked. I must escort them away before their ears are offended any further.
TWITCHY (with pride): I am… an ass pirate!
SARAH: Ah, too late.
TWITCHY: No, don’t go! Come back, I promise I won’t talk any more.
SARAH: And yet, in this awkward moment? WE GO.
SARAH CROSS (as we departed): I love New York.

I walked the Brooklyn Bridge and admired the sparkling summertime waters, visited huge artificial waterfalls, went to a dozen bookshops where I behaved inappropriately, and had dinner on a ship circling the night-time lights of Manhattan. I love New York.

Then I came home to Ireland to the bosom of my family. My baby brother Saul was delighted to see me.

SAUL: Sarah, Sarah, Sarah! What does my hair smell like?
SARAH: Uh, hair?
SAUL: And delicious, delicious mangos.
SARAH: I see you have not changed.

My flatmates were rather bemused by the fact I was home for a week, and then off to see my friends Cassie and Ruby in London. I’m having many adventures here, too. Stay tuned for those.

Now I’m off to gaze at my cover for another half hour…

So I was five, and one of those rotten precocious children. Baby Sarah taught herself to read and write, and was incredibly snotty.

In her defence, her life was made bitter by the fact that her mother cut her boring brown hair in a bowl cut and grew her baby brother's shining silver-fair hair into a swinging pageboy.

KINDLY GENTLEMAN AT THE TRAIN STATION: You be a good boy and look after your little sister!
BABY SARAH: Thank you for delivering that complex in a box.
BABY RORY: C'mon. I gotta go home. Do manly things.
BABY SARAH: You don't want to play Barbies today?
BABY RORY: ... Only if they play sports. Manly sports.

Also of course, Baby Sarah was just advanced and not a Secret Genius, so a few years later she wasn't going to be much good at anything but English. A few years after that there was a fire in Home Economics and a disastrous spill in Chemistry, and - well, let me put it this way, my whole school experience was interesting, but not remarkable for my stunning brilliance.

At the time, obviously, I thought I was awesome and I kept trying to make other people agree. So, baby nerd Sarah, a walking bowl cut and spectacles with probably a little person hidden under there somewhere, goes up to her grandfather. Grandpa Jack was this giant ex-army dock worker covered in tattoos and who had jet-black hair at seventy: he had no idea what to make of me. Possibly he thought my parents had adopted me from Mars.

BABY SARAH: I WROTE A BOOK.
GRANDPA JACK: Um.
BABY SARAH: (waves a red folder containing two sheets of papers, one much scribbled on and one containing a very bad picture of a house) IT HAS TAKEN ME MANY YEARS TO COMPLETE MY GREAT WORK.
GRANDPA JACK: Honey, it's the most awesome book ever.
BABY SARAH: Yes, that's what I thought.
GRANDPA JACK: (watching me as I departed) Oh little Martian baby, when will you learn our earth ways?

You may ask me what the point of this story is, and it totally has a point. I always wanted to write books. Since books were the things I saw on shelves, the objects that I loved.

The idea of short stories never occurred to me. Give me a break, I was five.

By the time I was in my twenties, though, I still didn't quite get short stories. I tried to write a couple, and I remember being extremely pleased when a friend read my version of Hansel and Gretel and went 'Oh God, urgh, what is wrong with you?'

Part of the problem, I think, was that I read very fast. A short story is a snack for me. One bite and I am sitting there going 'Please sir, may I have some more?' I get very attached to characters and situations. Why isn't this a meal, I wonder about my snack. Why isn't it a delicious, delicious book.

I was twenty-three and living in England, and I knew I couldn't write a short story, so I decided to learn. And first that meant appreciating short stories for what they were, and not wishing they were books.

There are short stories like Ursula LeGuin's The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas and Neil Gaiman's The Problem of Susan out there. I loved them: I knew they were worthwhile. I just needed to try and understand better.

I read a lot of short stories. I now own a lot of Sylvia Townsend Warner and Kelly Link. My latest short story anthology purchase was one called So Fey, a collection of gay fairy stories, my very favourite of which was the truly awesome Ever So Much More Than Twenty by Joshua Lewis.

I learned the way writing short stories works for me. The first thing to do is, when you glimpse a short story idea, just jump on it and wrestle it to the ground and beat it senseless

SARAH (one rainy day in Guildford, jumping up from the sofa): UNICORNS!
OLYMPIA (our guest): Does she do this a lot?
PENELOPE: Almost daily.
SARAH: So, unicorns, right, they can tell if you're pure, am I right?
OLYMPIA: Well - yes.
SARAH: So unicorns would be really excellent chaperones for young ladies, am I right? They'd never let a gentleman's hands stray! That makes sense!
PENELOPE: Sense is such a strong word.
SARAH: I have to go write, 'scuse me...

I have to jump on it before it even tries to think about becoming a book. It will come as no surprise at all to anyone reading this journal that I tend to go on and on.

Short stories have length limits. People expect them to be, like, short or something. Don't ask me.

SARAH: FOUR THOUSAND WORDS! That's not even half a chapter!
UNSYMPATHETIC FRIEND: You have to stop writing such long-ass chapters.

Books can have about a thousand purposes. When I write short stories, I limit myself to two purposes. One is to make people laugh. The other is to punch people in the heart.

Both of those are fun things to do if you can. Combining them is even more fun. Usually I manage neither, but even trying is fun, and keeping my eye on one or the other goal lets me write short stories.

I still write 'em too long. I still read a whole lot more books than short stories. But I appreciate the short stories now, and I think I write them a little better.

And I have another small story. So Sherwood Smith (otherwise known as sartorias, author of Crown Duel and other novels, a lady most excellently cool) was talking about the fact she'd been asked by Coyote Wild, an online magazine which contained stories by her and Elizabeth Bear and other people also most excellently cool, to do a special Young Adult edition and choose stories with the help of a teen panel.

SARAH: Real teenagers say whether they like you or not! That is the coolest thing.
SARAH: I wish I wasn't short-story-impaired.
SARAH: Well, I guess I could maybe just send that one story in. I mean. Teen panel.
SARAH: eats liquorice for liquorice courage, the YA version of liquid courage

To make a long story (not all that) short, the first short story I wrote during my intensive training-myself-to-write-short stories phase is up on Coyote Wild Magazine now. It contains unicorn chaperones, frog accountants and jokes about necrophilia. It's called An Old-Fashioned Unicorn's Guide to Courtship.

I am pretty happy. If I had a time machine, I'd go back and high-five Baby Sarah.

And I have a question. If you read/write short stories, how do you read/write yours? What's your system?

Previously on this journal, I recorded my unwise decision to travel practically, uh, everywhere. I also recorded my experiences in Massachusetts (waterfalls, mills and secret libraries) and in Oklahoma (ice-cream and taped evidence of my zombie obsession).

There have been other adventures since then, in Vancouver, Hawaii and of course, the city most likely to take a restraining order out against me, my gorgeous New York.

Vancouver won an unexpected prize for having the most beautiful airport I have ever seen. We were standing in a long, long line for people who are inconsiderately not Canadian, and I extolled its beauties to a harried-looking Chinese lady at some length.

SARAH: The rushing waterfall, merrily frothing on its course!
CHINESE LADY: Uh-huh.
SARAH: The limpid pools! The rushing rivers!
CHINESE LADY: breaks and runs
SARAH: Where are you going? We’re almost at the head of the line!
CHINESE LADY: (eyeing me with burning reproach) I HAVE TO PEE, OKAY?

In Vancouver I saw two of my best friends, Ashling the Artist and the fabulous Jonas Wilde. I also saw Ginny Sue, one of my best friends from school, who I hadn’t seen for years and who I love even though she is single-handedly responsible for me seeing Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith.

SARAH: What do you do now?
GINNY SUE: I save the world! Well, the ecology of Canada. Yesterday my department saved sixty frogs. What do you do now?
SARAH: … I kill trees. So, so many trees. Shine on, you frog-saving diamond.

Being artistic and scintillating types, Ashling and I naturally spent a great deal of time eating cupcakes and discussing Gossip Girl. I feel no shame about this whatsoever, and am happy to report to everyone that Vancouver is all cupcakes and sunshine, and thus my exact idea of a good time.

It should go without saying that Hawaii is a good time. From the moment I peeped out my airplane window and saw the ocean below, turquoise with tiny sparkling waves that made it look like someone had sprinkled glitter all over the water, I loved it.

I landed amid scorching sunshine and huge red tropical flowers bobbing their heads at me as if they were Victorian ladies half-curtsying and half-crushed under the weight of huge bonnets, and met up with my friend maprilynne, otherwise known as the lovely Aprilynne Pike (author of Wings, which comes out a month before my book and which everyone will buy instead and leave me weeping softly in a corner) and her family. She has a baby boy who I immediately started to toddle around the hotel and have adventures with.

SARAH: Hooray, baby, we’re at the gift shop!
BABY: Look at these tiny bottles of alcohol.
SARAH: Baby, you and I are so simpatico.
BABY: I make a little castle of alcohol.
SARAH: Yay!
APRILYNNE: I turn my back for a minute and you get my one year old into the liquor?
SARAH: Yes! No. Maybe?
APRILYNNE: I expected no less.

Since we were at the Maui Writers’ Retreat, we did quite a bit of writing and I met lots of writers, who always have the best ideas. Bill from my class brought cookies in! Heather who wrote about sexy dragons (there must be more dragon books in the world. I just read Victory of Eagles and almost wept at how cool it was) suggested we go on a sunset cruise. Patricia Wood (author of Lottery, which I read on my way to a luau) had dinner with me and Aprilynne high above the lights of Honolulu.

Aprilynne and I went to that luau, where we were presented with purple leis. I approve of leis very much.

SARAH: I see now that my low neckline (People, it was very warm! I was being practical!) is in fact perfectly designed. For my modesty is preserved by a lei.
APRILYNNE: Yes, but you’ve been wearing that neckline all day, baby.
SARAH: I was just getting ready for my lei. This is my lei line.

We saw beautiful dances, and beautiful dancers. My favourite was the Tahiti fire dances. Most would have been content to be enraptured by this display of a diverse and ancient culture, and would not have quietly started re-interpreting many of the dances. (Which is to say, I am very sorry for my rendition of ‘My Hula Skirt Brings All the Boys to the Yard’ and I see now it was inappropriate.)

One of the most exciting things about Hawaii was that I got to meet my agent, Kristin Nelson. As you can tell from my other posts about her, I love my agent. So of course, I promptly went into hysterics. What if she didn’t like me? What if she dodged my calls from now on because I was obviously a fruit loop? Did my lei make me look fat?

We met at the beach where the sunset was painting the sea orange and yellow and scarlet, and had icy strawberry drinks. It was the loveliest way possible to meet my agent. And, because I am blessed with almost miraculous good luck, she was even more awesome than I thought she would be. We talked about volleyball and vampires and our mutual love for Sherry Thomas. And she said one of the best things ever to me. Ever.

SARAH: So… what topic is meant to be hot these days? What’s the next big thing? (I was just curious, you guys! I swear, if she had said ‘Time-travelling mermaids romance’ I wouldn’t have sent her a letter the next day saying ‘1,000 Leagues Under the Sea (And Back In Time!) Gods, men and a horrified publishing industry said it was not to be, but they would not listen! Ugga, a Neandarthal who has just invented primitive snorkeling, meets Rides A Shark, the adventurous merman who will now proceed to rock her like a tsunami…’)
KRISTIN: Don’t ever worry about that. Just write well. That’s what people really want to see. That’s the only thing I want to see.

Which for someone whose job is to sell my books (and the books of others, sure, fine, them too) as saleable to publishing houses, I thought was particularly wonderful advice. I do not have enough good things to say about my agent. Of course, I may be praising her because the next day, we went out to the sea and she now has a picture of us in bikinis.

You know I make wombat faces in pictures. Imagine a wombat in a bikini. (Or don’t. You already did, didn’t you? Um… sorry about that.)

This post has now grown epic as the love between a cavewoman and a merman, so I will save my adventures in New York for later! Though I leave you guys a hint about the adventure with the pirate.

You guys may have noticed that I’ve been strangely, sweetly quiet lately. Probably you were just thankful for that and didn’t wonder what I was doing. ‘Best not to speculate,’ you said to yourselves. ‘She could be up to anything.’

I have been up to copyedits!

Copyedits are something that happens to you after you’re finished with your edits, meaning there will be no more major changes to your book and your editor’s pretty happy with it. (Or she has dramatically flung down her red pen and said ‘Enough of this! I have many editorial things to do. You’re going into copyedits… and may God have mercy on your soul.’)

You can have several rounds of edits before your editor is happy with the book. I was very lucky: I had one. A girl I know had eight! The book is a shining pearl of perfection now of course, and she’s fine. When unkind people don’t startle her by making loud noises.

So going into copyedits goes a bit like this…

SARAH: I am done! All done! I know what will happen in my book, I will never be asked to change anything else. Oh I am so happy. Nobody has ever been as happy as me. And you know what this means, flatmates! It means party time.
FLATMATES: watch Sarah do a combined jig and Moonwalk across the floor
FLATMATES: look very sad
COPYEDITS: arrive
SARAH: Oh yes, copyedits. They correct teeny weeny things like spelling and grammar, don’t they? Easy peasy! A snap! After all, I was the school spelling bee champion and I have completed my actual edits. I am INVINCIBLE!
COPYEDITS: are opened
SARAH: Oh dear God what are these arcane markings.
SARAH: … Somebody’s gone mad. It’s either me or a total stranger hired by the publishing house.
SARAH: Yeah, it’s probably me.
SARAH: No, wait! I’ve worked it all out! This is code. A devious spy’s code. I must get it to the Secret Service immediately or the nation will crumble. Yes, that makes sense! It’s all so clear now!

Click here for a look at what copyedits actually look like and what the arcane marks mean, and here for Deanna Hoak’s basic guide to copyedits. She really knows what she’s talking about: I reacted to my copyedits like a penguin in a fit. You know who you should go to for information.

Sometimes copyedits are a simple matter of your copyeditor switching ‘Nick said’ to ‘said Nick.’ Then all you do is stare at that, wonder why she changed it and if it matters and which way looks best, and then you tear out all your hair and use the torn-out hair as a hanky to wipe your fevered brow. Simple!

Sometimes your copyeditor will have bigger changes: she’s got a far away enough perspective of the book to catch things like the time of day. This is especially helpful for me – I use weather like a mood ring for my characters sometimes.

SARAH: Blow, winds, blow, and crack your cheeks!
COPYEDITOR: Uh, but it is June.

Sometimes we come up against the language barrier.

COPYEDITOR: What is candyfloss?
SARAH: What? Are you kidding me? You buy it at fairs, it is a pink and fluffy cloud of deliciousness on a stick!
COPYEDITOR: Oh cotton candy.
SARAH: Cotton? Ew. Cotton is material. Have you ever tasted cotton?
COPYEDITOR: Well I can’t say I…
SARAH: Cotton is not delicious!

Copyedits are also your last chance to get in eleventh-hour brilliant ideas. And not so brilliant ideas, like adding the Spanish Inquisition into your surfing scene. (Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition. Particularly when the surf is up.)

In the last week I was mostly to be found sitting in a nest of papers in a café, cackling weakly to myself at intervals. Sometimes my friends would come by and while I made odd sounds like a koala in a tin bath, they would pat me. I rewrote a few scenes so they actually made sense. I added a few things I thought were funny. I took some of them out because on later reflection, they were insane.

I was on the iced hot chocolates, you see. Sometimes I got the shakes. But then...

SARAH: Cassie! I am finished with my copyedits! Now it is party time.
CASSIE AND CAFE RESIDENTS: watch Sarah do a combined jig and Moonwalk across the floor
CASSIE AND CAFE RESIDENTS: look very sad

But I do not care, for I have a beautiful new fan community called marmalade_fish and a beautiful finished website. I am done with my copyedits and now, for a limited time only, I am INVINCIBLE!

My American adventures have been quite something so far, and it's not even August.

I flew into New York and almost instantly was in the car down to Massachusetts with my friends Cassie and Josh. While in the car I chatted with my agent and my editor, who are being magnificently fabulous as usual and keeping me in the loop about my cover model. (I have a cover model! And a photoshoot! Some days it is a great effort to restrain myself from going for the medicinal brandy at all hours.)

SARAH: I like this model very much. I admire his dark intensity! In a professional way. Yes. Professional.
CAR RADIO: Hot-blooded, check it and see! I got a fever of a hundred and three!
AGENT: Did you hear something?
EDITOR: I think I heard something.
SARAH: Really, because I heard nothing. Nothing at all!

Before I get into the conventions I have just attended in Massachusetts and Oklahoma, have you ever wondered what else I do on the net besides bothering you guys? No? Too bad, I shall tell you anyway!

Among other things I belong to a very awesome community called fangs_fur_fey, which is set up for writers of urban fantasy. Over there I interview authors. Other interviewers ask insightful and thoughtful questions... I mostly ask about characters' underwear. (I'm not kidding. One writer asked me if I'd do one of my underwear interviews with her. I bring such shame to the entire writing community.)

Despite all the shame I bring and due entirely to the awesomeness of my interviewees, I've done fun interviews with Tiffany Trent, Melissa Marr, Shanna Swendson and Sarah Prineas, and I was looking forward to hanging out with them and other fangs_fur_fey people in Oklahoma a lot. I was also scared down to my socks since the only person there I knew was Tiffany, and I could hardly hang onto her hand and hide behind her all weekend. (For one thing, hiding behind people while being almost six feet tall is a sad and hopeless task.) Plus, in Oklahoma I was going to be on panels. Sitting in front of audiences talking to them as if I knew what I was saying. With cameras rolling, too.

I went to Readercon determined to learn everything I could and to Conestoga hoping I would not make a dreadful twit of myself. And I probably did make a twit of myself, but I had so much fun!

What I loved the most about both the conventions was something Melissa pointed out, which was that writers talk in a particularly fun way. In Oklahoma we all started talking about trying to read in the shower and how it never ends well, lucky numbers and the lovely Rachel Vincent and I launched into a serious discussion of how much we wanted a nemesis. We agreed to share one and combine our powers to defeat them, once they showed up. In Massachusetts Holly Black started a spirited debate about the Functions of Werewolves In Fiction. Number Five is to lose out to vampires in romance. Oh, those wily vampires. I think it's because they're more metrosexual than werewolves.

GIRL: How, how do I choose between my two supernatural suitors?
WEREWOLF: I offer you eternal, almost doglike, devotion. And wild, not to say animal, passion!
GIRL: That does sound good...
VAMPIRE: But I'm a snappy, snappy dresser. And I never have to wax my back.
GIRL: Sold!

The conventions were also notably awesome because several people came up to me and said that they liked this journal. Thank you, guys! You are extremely fantabulous and I was terribly pleased to meet you all. Though a trifle embarrassed, since of course there is no book to talk about yet, so most of what I had to offer was clever remarks like 'Watch me - I have learned the arcane art of eating with sticks!' and 'Raisinets, such an exotic name!' Note to self in future: try to be less lame. Perhaps come up with song and dance routine!

Speaking of the book, talking about it at cons has reminded me that I really must think up a brilliant and snappy way to describe it. So far the best I can come up with us 'He's a sullen, slightly sultry sword-wielding mechanic. He's a sweet Sumerian-loving nerd and a crack shot. Together (somewhat distracted by demons, earring-wearing boys and ferocious ladies) they fight crime magicians.' Which is not exactly snappy.

Between conventions I imposed terribly on blackholly and spent several delirious days with her and other lovely folks, popping in and out of her secret library, running through torrential rain in a shoulderless gown to hear a story that blended Frankenstein and Pride and Prejudice, and writing next to a waterfall.

Then it was off to Oklahoma, where not only was I on panels, but I actually moderated the Demons, Fairies and Zombies panel. Moderators have to organise and lead the discussion. (In front of cameras!) I was glazed like a ham with panic and of course all I did was make jokes and try to organise people into Team Zombie, Team Faery and Team Demon. Team Faery (Melissa Marr and Marie Brennan, tragically no relation) knew a thousand interesting things about faeries. I mostly made up stories about the lost Shakespeare zombie play.

SARAH: Everyone likes an undead boyfriend, am I right? We've already got tons of vampire boyfriends lying around the place slippin' girls some tongue and fang combo.
AUDIENCE: Oh God, she is crazy.
SARAH: So I predict that the next big thing will be zombie boyfriends!
MELISSA: What would I do with a boyfriend who was decaying, Miss Vile Imagination Rees Brennan?
SARAH: ... You could keep him in the fridge!

Jen Barnes decided that the whole convention should be translated into song, and I was pretty pleased that my assigned song was something I apparently said at my panel, Rosemary And Her Babydaddy (Didn't Have A Forever Kind of Love). Feel free to think up the lyrics to that one, and I will sing them!

After the panels Ally Carter, blessings and chocolate sprinkles be on her name, took me away and fed me hot fudge sundaes. This sugar high turned out to be a terrible mistake when I was brought back to meet innocent people who were fixed with my crazy eyes and asked: "So, would you be Team Vampire or Team Werewolf?"

Saturday night featured patricemichelle's clever drinks ideas and me, so tuckered out, unable to keep my eyes open. But I couldn't possibly go to bed, because two brilliant and funny ladies were telling stories. Jen Barnes was on one side of the room saying 'And the monkey leaped for my throat, so I had to attack him with limes!' and Ilona Andrews was on the other saying 'The situation involving the pig went badly, but then there was that whole business with the dead body...'

There was no way I could go to bed and miss all that. Which meant I was slightly overtired the next night in Chicago, when I had another adventure that involved an ancient Chinese sage, a fiend in the shape of an airline attendant, a terrified fifteen year old girl and a tray full of buttermilk doughnuts.

I like conventions! I must admit that I'm a little nervous about the video footage...

This weekend I went to a wedding in a small town in Durham, England. I flew into Newcastle to get there. It was all meant to be very sweet and sleepy and uneventful...

Yes, well, that was the plan.

As you all know, I've been ill, but I seemed to be recovering well. I went to a barbecue Friday and had a nice time, but felt a little under the weather so I went home early. I got my early flight Saturday morning. I got on the plane. I started to feel a little woozy, so I got up to wash my face in the ladies'.

I awoke passed out across the laps of several gentlemen. They were on their way to a stag party, and seemed surprised that somebody had ordered a young lady to entertain them on the plane.

Then I went through the airport, passed out again and had to answer many pointed questions on the composition of my flu medications.

After that I brilliantly decided not to get on public transport and hopped into a taxi.

SARAH: Please take me to this address! And do not worry if I faint. It is sort of a theme for my morning.
TAXI DRIVER: ... Okay?
SARAH (brightly): Also could you keep count of how many times I faint for me? I think I may be about to establish some kind of record.

I fainted a lot on that trip. Finally we got to my hotel, which was also the hotel for the wedding reception. By this point probably convinced I had the plague, my driver helped me to the reception desk. He was a parfait gentil knight, my driver.

RECEPTIONIST: Sorry, your bed's not ready yet! We could find you a nice place to sit down.
SARAH: I need a bed!
SARAH: faints again, wakes up on the marble floor. The first thing she hears is her brave taxi driver, saying...
DRIVER: SHE NEEDS A BED!
SARAH: How many times was that?

The kind hotel folks found me a bed. I slept for four hours, then woke to the sound of my alarm and wandered out, feeling considerably better. Then I found the happy groom, my dear friend, a stubbly crime writer who I call Flower.

SARAH: Flower! It's so great to see you! Happy wedding day! I fainted fourteen times!
FLOWER: ... Ah, Sarah. I see you haven't changed a bit.

I found my scandalous shoulderless dress and ran out to the church. The wedding ceremony was in a quaint beautiful stone church, and the ceremony was conducted by a vicar who looked a little startled by the heathen faces of so many Londoners and the heathen face of me and the presence of a baby, much impressed by the surroundings, who kept going 'Whoa!'

VICAR: And here is this rope. It is made of three cords. The cords represent the three people in this marriage.
BABY: Whoa!
SARAH: Whoa indeed, baby. Whoa indeed!
VICAR (reproving): The bride, the groom and God.

The wedding was followed by celebrations, the most dazzling moment of which was during the first dance, when the bride and groom waltzed as on a beauteous cloud of love for half the dance. Then the bride picked up her skirt and showed everyone she was wearing sparkly running shoes, and they danced up a storm. I danced quite a bit myself, especially for a girl who'd fainted fourteen times that day.

The day after the wedding, there was a car journey with lovely friends playing country music up to London, and in London I saw my much-missed ex-flatmate Penelope and my friend Ki, and I both borrowed and bought many, many books. 'Why did you do that?' you may well ask. And I would answer, 'For the plane.'

The flight back to Ireland from England is not terribly long, you might point out. And this is true.

Only the thing is, I knew two days after I flew back from England, I'd be flying to America. In the trip that will never ever end.

You may all know that I love New York, city of a thousand sights, a billion lights and a squillion trillion lovely bookshops, and I go back there whenever I can. It is the summer and school is out and I am free, so I told myself I'd pop over. On business. I could totally find business there! And since I was going to be over there, I should go to Vancouver where three of my best friends now live, so far away from me!

See, the thing is I live on a teeny tiny island. It's about the size of a pea. So I never believe that America is Really Really Large.

I heard about Readercon, a small convention that sounded like a book group and therefore awesome, and was in Massachusetts. 'Massachusetts can't be that far,' I told myself. 'I've been there! Once.'

And I heard about Conestoga, where I would get to sit on panels beside awesome people, and talk about books, and with any luck not make a blithering fool of myself. 'Oklahoma can't be that far,' I told myself. I tell myself terrible lies and I am going to be a wreck, but I am also going to be on panels! One of them is called 'Faeries, Demons and Zombies, Oh My!' I fear I am going to squeak like a huge excited bat in a sundress.

Also at Conestoga, they are scheduling dates with authors. Er. I hope someone will date me! I will try to look pretty. Or authorial. Depending on what they require. (If I can manage it, I will look both pretty and authorial, but I may fall between two stools and end up looking like I have crazy eyes.)

Then I was hanging out in my writers' group, The Debs, also known as debut2009. I love the Debs: we formed together out of a misunderstanding and stayed together to run around panicking about our books coming out next year, debate which fictional characters we'd lock in a basement and have serious, in-depth discussions about our favourite candy. My friend maprilynne mentioned that she was going to a Writers' Retreat, and said it seemed like a fun yet businesslike thing to do, and hadn't I mentioned that I wanted a sun holiday, just once in two years?

SARAH: No I can't possibly! I am much much too busy!
APRILYNNE: It's in Honolulu.
SARAH: ... Honolulu can't be that far...

Quite a couple of months ahead of me, but it's my own fault, and I think I will have a good time as well. If any of you guys are in New York, Oklahoma, Massachusetts or Honolulu and you see a tall girl fainting dramatically, it's probably me.

If you see me do it more than once, start keeping count.

The time has come to confess this: I am wretchedly ill. I have been in sniffly denial for some time, but today it is beyond my power to deny. I was sitting wrapped in a blanket writing fighting scenes (almost as good as make-out scenes!) and I kept thinking 'Must buy milk!'

Eventually I tottered weakly down to the shop.

SHOPKEEPER: Love, I think you've had enough.
SARAH (peers intently at the carton): But this is - I mean, this is milk, isn't it?
SHOPKEEPER: Yes. You've been down here and bought milk three times today.
SARAH: ... Huh.

Some time later, the Durham Lass came home and flopped on the sofa.

DURHAM LASS: I need tea. Do you know, I think if I developed an allergy to tea, I would have to top myself.
SARAH: I am glad you want tea! Let's all have tea! With lots of milk!
DURHAM LASS: Oh, good, did you buy milk?
SARAH: Don't look in the fridge!

Out of pity the Durham Lass has been entertaining me with many interesting historical facts! And I have been contributing to the conversation as well.

DURHAM LASS: Do you know that the ancient Greeks used to make puns with their coinage?
SARAH: My head feels all fizzy!
DURHAM LASS: The Chinese Emperor was buried surrounded by mercury, in an elaborate tomb that may resemble the universe and that is definitely filled with treasure. We can't open it yet, but someday we may have the technology to do so and, er, not die.
SARAH (seriously): If I had a car... I would make it go vroom.

I am not updating to tell people merely that I am sick. That would be very dull for you all! It's also been a while since I made a books post, so I decided to recommend two books I enjoyed recently - and also to make a point connected to both of them.

My friend sluzan and I were having one of those writing days that turn into writing nights and, since it was four a.m. and all, she decided to sleep over. Once in bed, we both broke out books: I was reading Evernight by Claudia Gray and she was reading Northlander by Meg Burden. I went to get a glass of water.

SUSAN: Oh God, not another redheaded heroine!
SARAH: Stop reading my book this instant!
SUSAN: ... I wasn't.
SARAH: ... Oh God.

Look, I've liked many a redheaded heroine. But being a redhead is rare, you guys. And I'm saying this as an Irish person. And the fact it's rare is reflected in that you see an appropriate amount (i.e. few) minor characters with red hair. But redheaded heroines are everywhere! To the point where when I opened Diana Wynne Jones's House of Many Ways and found a redheaded heroine, I winced.

I winced at a Diana Wynne Jones book. Such a thing should not be.

The redheadedness of their heroines aside, these were good books!

( House of Many Ways by Diana Wynne Jones: Books, True Love and Disgustingly Pretty Wizards )

( Evernight by Claudia Gray: Boarding School, Vampires and Blisteringly Hot Make-out Scenes )

So, any book recs for me? Equal romances? Down-to-earth magic? Only non-redheaded heroines may apply. (Unless the book is really awesome.)

You guys, I am so touched by you all congratulating my friend! This reminds me of when I made my announcement about my book, and my father read all the comments and was extremely moved. 'The internet is so kind!' he said. 'I'm sorry for telling you all those times that you were going to be kidnapped and sold into the white slave trade.'

Personally I also feel he should be sorry he said I was bound to be returned, but whatever.

Anyway, I made you a thank-you present! Also I felt it was time for another movie parody. Tragically the movie was rather good so it was hard to parody, and I fear that Prince Caspian has been out in America so long that nobody will care! But we Irish are much oppressed and it just came out here, so I hope you guys will enjoy anyway!

( Peter the Magnificent and Caspian the Super Fine: A Prince Caspian Parody )

Edited to Add: Check out these awesome icons!

I've been thinking about names recently. Naming characters, to be precise, since I don't have any babies or puppies to name at present.

Mostly (for me) naming characters it is a bit like naming a baby or a puppy: you try to go with something fairly normal so they won't get beat up in the playground or sneered at while you're walking them in the park. And something nice. Something that suits them. So there's the Baby Names approach.

There's also the Dropping Hints approach. For instance, a character called Thomas Lynn is going to make me hold onto everything and wait for the Queen of Fairies to arrive. A girl called Ella mistreated by her family causes me to be on the lookout for fancy but fragile footwear.

These are the fairly unsubtle Dropping Hints names. There are also very cool Dropping Hints names. In Diana Wynne Jones's Howl's Moving Castle the wizard Howl is actually named Howell Jenkins, which tells us about his super-ordinary Welsh background, about the name he's chosen and how he wants to appear to people, the kind of person he is. About the name he hasn't chosen.

Those names are my favourite kinds of names. There's a girl in Demon's Lexicon called Mae, and she introduces herself by saying 'not like the month, like Mae West.' Which isn't just about spelling, of course.

We use names to make ourselves seem the way we want to be, and when we're making people up their names are important! They're our best label. (Plus, Mae West is really awesome. Everybody knows.)

There's also Naming Characters After People. I don't use real people's characters in my books (because they would yell, and sue me) but sometimes I do just need a name, any name! And then I pick one of my friend's names.

So one day the beautiful and talented Susan (one of the many beautiful talented people I have so unwisely chosen to associate with), my writing buddy in Ireland, veteran of many days in cafes with molten lava cakes and my friend since I was sixteen, said unto me accusingly: "You've never used my name in a story."

"No?" I said, a little startled. "Okay, well, I will!"

Some months later Susan called me.

SUSAN: So I was reading your story. And there was a Susan in it, all sexy, and much with the making out, just like me. And I was so pleased.
SARAH: Uh.
SUSAN: And then she turned out to be a transvestite explain yourself.
SARAH: Um. Um. Coincidence?

Speaking of Susan, she just scored her first book deal. If you guys would go congratulate her, that would make me very happy! (And might make up for the, uh, transvestite thing.)

Another instance of this is that I used the Durham Lass's real name in my book. And in my first draft, I killed her. She took this surprisingly well, and even agreed to move in with me.

My agent, however, was very set on saving the Durham Lass's namesake. And she was right, too, but we went back and forth on it a bit. There were several days which I spent pacing the floor fixing people with a beady eye and announcing darkly: "I must kill the Durham Lass. I must have blood."

The Durham Lass did not move out. I can only attribute this to an act of God.

So, how do you name yours? How do you choose pseudonyms, if you have them (this being the internet)? Know any good Dropping Hints names?

I have a confession. I love to travel and to see my friends who are not in Ireland that way, but I also love visitors. So I try to allure my friends hither. And oh, I tell lies.

SARAH: Oh come! It'll be great! We'll have drinks! It's the Emerald Isle. The Isle of Saints and Scholars. I'll show you around.

This is the method I used to bring my friends Cassie and Holly over, and they were almost eaten by cat-food-lovin' maniacs. This week I had my friend Vin over. She was another hapless victim I have wooed with my cruel, lying siren song.

SARAH: First we go to Powerscourt!
VIN: Piratescourt?
SARAH: No.
VIN: Can we call it Piratescourt?
SARAH: ... Yes, I think that would be a good idea.

Powerscourt is a beautiful country manor that was built to be a super gorgeous showcase, cast the noble family who built it into debt and ruination, and which was then bought by wealthy people who vowed to restore it to its former glory.

... That very night, it burned to the ground. The gardens are very pretty, though! Especially the giant waterfall.

SARAH: For King George's visit the waterfall was dammed and a special bridge built so the king could see its dramatic release. The force of the waterfall broke the bridge and killed the king in the most hilarious royal death ever.
VIN'S FRIEND RIA: Vin, I want you to know that is not true.
SARAH: It could've been true. Except that the king was having such a rocking party that he wouldn't go out to the waterfall. Kept saying 'margaritas for the king!'
VIN: Is that bit true?
SARAH: Of course it is! What else would you say, if you were king?

We were prowling through Powerscourt's redone house when we turned a doorknob and wandered into an unguarded and fully stocked bar. I looked around, then slid insouciantly behind it.

SARAH: Drinks, ladies?
VIN: Margaritas for the king!

It is possible that I should mention before people come to visit that my knowledge of my city is somewhat... patchy. But then they might not come to visit me! Anyway I feel it is all okay, because I know many awesome stories. Some of them are true, as well!

VIN: What's that stick you have on one of your streets?
SARAH (blithely): It was erected to commemorate St Patrick, who banished the snakes from Ireland with a staff!
RIA: What's she talking about? What stick? Do you mean the Millennium Spire?
SARAH: Oh, is that what she meant? I see.
VIN: I - you - but you just answered, you just gave me an answer!
SARAH: Well, I thought you'd like one.
VIN: Is there no end to your lies?

However, I was punished for my fibs. We ascended a horse-drawn omnibus for the most touristish part of the show, and were delighted to be given cloaks and little fancy hats. Then Ria and Vin sat together... and I was left sitting next to a little girl in a Hello Kitty raincoat. Her mother was right behind me. I was in fear.

COACHMAN: Let's pretend that we've moved back in time hundreds of years.
SARAH: I shall pretend I have a facial ulcer! And that the streets are filled with-
LIL MISS HELLO KITTY: With what? With what?
SARAH: ... Let me help you with your cape.
COACHMAN: Here we are passing Bram Stoker's h-
SARAH: I know a thing about Bram Stoker!
LIL MISS HELLO KITTY: What?
SARAH: Well, it's a story about mutilation and dev - Uh. Um. He liked vampires, honey.
LIL MISS HELLO KITTY: I like vampires.
SARAH: Cool.
COACHMAN: Let's sing a song about Molly Malone.
LIL MISS HELLO KITTY: In Dublin's fair city, where the girls are so pretty-
SARAH: Sweetie, no, that song is about ladies of easy virtue.
LIL MISS HELLO KITTY: About what?
SARAH: ... Uh. Um. Look! The horsie is doing a wee.

Other notable features of the visit included Vin climbing to sit in the lap of a statue of Oscar Wilde, my dramatic reading of the worst book in the world in a juice bar, and going to the workplace of my flatmate the Durham Lass. She showed us to a special room and let us see fourteenth century books. Other people were peeping in, but they could not follow us. They did not have our contacts.

The last day we planned to see Christchurch in the afternoon, but it was raining hard so we stayed in, had cakes and curled our hair.

SARAH (wistfully): I would have liked to tell you all about Christchurch.
VIN: I am so sad to have missed all those lies.

I like having friends to stay. It is like a holiday from the comfort of my own home, and in good company.

Dear friends of mine reading this post: you should come to visit me, we'll have lots of fun! Trust me. I'm telling you stories.