I can't even describe how much I love Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog (here, for anyone who's slow to the bandwagon). It's true great Joss. I heard a clip on NPR tonight about it!

Book log, rather than book review, because I can't get a handle on this one. It's the first book in Reginald Hill's Joe Sixsmith series, I've been reading the book on and off for nearly a month, and I was just not getting into it most of the way through. But I think it's me, rather than the book, because I love Hill's Dalziel and Pascoe books, and I enjoyed a later book in the Joe Sixsmith series when I read it a year or two back. I'll leave it and re-read it in a few months, and see if I do better with it then.

LibraryThing entry.

I mostly don't point at reviews of my books, but since this is one I solicited specifically because I'd been impressed with the reviews Azteclady had been doing, I will mention that I am well pleased with the review she's given Black Leather Rose, posted at Karen Knows Best.

(And I know some people reading this have commented on the review there or when it was posted at Suzanne Brockmann's board -- thanks.)

Last night I had a massage and was so tired when I got home I pretty much went straight to bed. So I'm using this space to store this link to my favorite Sim movie so I don't lose it again. It's called Kyle's Life and it has great music and is just a neat multi-part story.

Missed last week's because day job was hectic and I was too wiped out to even read blogs, let alone compose a post. This week's prompt is:

Today's topic: Book-swapping. Do you do it? What site(s) do you use? How did you find out about them? What do you think of them? Do you use LT's book-swapping column feature for information on what to swap? Do you participate in any of the LT communities that discuss bookswapping, like the Bookmooch group for example?

I don't use the book-swapping sites, for two simple reasons. One is that "swapping" implies that books will leave my possession. This is against the natural order of things, and not to be countenanced. The other is that until recently I lived a very short walk from a large used bookshop specialising in non-fiction and genre fiction, and I could buy books in there for less than the cost of postage on the book-swapping sites.

As a direct consequence of the second reason, I'm having to budge very slightly on the first. The To Be Read pile has grown to the size of a small mountain range, and I have been told by Other Half that I am not to buy any more bookcases, and that I am not to leave the books in piles on the floor, either. Thus, I must discipline myself and make some feeble gestures in the direction of a new book into the house means an old book leaving.

Which still leaves me with no good reason to join a book-swapping site, because the only reason I'm going to be getting rid of a book is that I've just had a shopping accident and need more space on the shelf. Swapping books will not reduce the actual book population as required...

The cover art for the Lord and Master sequel arrived today. Copy under the cut, as it's rather more NSFW than is usually the case with my cover art. annecain's done another lovely job.

( cover art )

I finally updated my sales spreadsheet with the figures for May and June, prompted by a thread at Absolute Write. Cutting and pasting what I posted there:

For some sales numbers -- of my 15 titles to date at Loose Id, I have one title with over 1500 copies sold, and four more with over 1000 copies sold, one of which will probably hit 1500 this month. (OTOH, I also have one that failed miserably, with only 150 copies in its first six months. Even at a successful epub, titles occasionally sink without trace.)

Obviously these are not necessarily an indicator of what other people might achieve, or indeed what I might achieve with future titles. But this is why I want to see hard numbers when epubbed authors say that a new epublisher has wonderful sales. My sales numbers are minuscule compared with those of my friends who are published in mass market paperback, but they are still an order of magnitude greater than those reported by authors at some epubs. I'm not saying this to brag, but to point out that authors can do better than a dozen copies sold in the first quarter. Loose Id's numbers weren't that wonderful when they first opened, but they were still significantly better than *that*.

sam_storyteller demonstrates that a humongous crossover like this

Torchwood/Discworld/Nero Wolfe/Lord Peter/Harry Potter/SGA/Jeeves&Wooster/Sherlock Holmes

can work in the right pair of hands. A lovely characterisation piece gives the sidekicks a place to relax and play poker in "The Royal Society":

http://sam-storyteller.livejournal.com/136730.html

Last week I got a cool new laptop bag at Office Max. It was on sale, marked down to $20 from $55.

( clicky )

We're going to see Namoli Brennet and Sabra Faulk at Mama Java's tonight. Five bucks, 8 pm. Be there or be square.

Via a long comment trail that started at Making Light:

Kitchenmage reports that MacDonald's is being boycotted -- but this time by a far right "Christian" group which objects to MacDonald's support of gay rights. MacD's response to the boycott threat is a corporate letter which is a lesson in how to write an exquisitely polite "go jump off a cliff, you unAmerican bigots". I'm impressed, both for the standing up to the bigots, and for the phrasing of the letter itself.

Too tired last night to check what the new Windows patch was and whether it had any known issues before letting it install on shutdown. Bad move. No intertubes when I booted this morning. Fortunately Other Half has been more in touch with cyberspace than I have this week, and was able to inform me that the new patch Does Not Play Well with ZoneAlarm. So entertainment over breakfast was switch on Windows firewall, switch off ZoneAlarm, go out and find the ZA patch, install, reboot. I have intertubes again, and am thinking that this weekend would be a really good time to get around to doing that full backup followed by spring-cleaning my hard drive.

ETA: Just in case anyone else uses ZA and hasn't already found out about this the hard way, here's the ZA advisory explaining what to do:
http://download.zonealarm.com/bin/free/pressReleases/2008/LossOfInternetAccessIssue.html

I found this cool site through a pmog mission. I like dolls and antiques and I love reading what collectors say about them. For example, about a doll on the Dolls from the 1930s page:

When I found this girl she was wearing a new homemade frilly colonial style dress that was not at all appropriate to her. I don't think the shop had any idea who she was.

ETA: Whoa, this quote is much better (emphasis mine):

I found this sweetheart at an antique store, dressed only in a diaper. Her eyes were permanently shut and she had a few large flaked compo areas on her legs. Her overall condition and coloring was very good so I took her home as my little challenge. I carefully loosened her head from the cloth body and found that all the stuffing had migrated into the head making it impossible for her eyes to open/close. I pulled it out and stuffed it back into her body, lifted her head and "ta-dah!", her beautiful blue eyes just beamed with delight!!

I have a mission for you all.

Go to this article about the most embarassing music moments in history. Scroll down all the way to the bottom and watch the video for "Girl You Know It's True" by Milli Vanilli. Then, take my poll!


Poll #1221388 Answer if you dare!!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What is the worse thing about "Girl You Know It's True"?

Were you ever a fan of Milli Vanilli?

only 2 more episodes of wonderfalls until we finish it! i wish there were more.

I forgot to tell the unexpected excitement that was waiting for me when I got home Sunday afternoon.

See, Friday I had Scott pick me up, and on my last trip out the door I stopped to fill up my water bottle with ice and cold water. I was apparently so excited to leave that I failed to notice that my freezer door did not shut all the way. So when I got home Sunday afternoon, it was to a puddle on the floor and lots of melted stuff. I threw away everything that couldn't be salvaged. But as you can see, the really important stuff survived:




That's right, Otter Pops and Thin Mints. All you really need.

No, I'm not telling you what it is other than it will soon be Soon(TM). Mostly because I'm not sure what the current policy is at LI on telling the readership exact publication dates, and I'm too tired to trawl through my mailspool looking for clues. However, I assume that it being included in an email listing forthcoming release dates means that it is well and truly officially contracted, even though the contract hardcopy hasn't made its way back across the Atlantic yet.

I have also seen a very early draft sketch of the cover art. *I* like it.