These words were hard won, between 6 a.m. alarms and dentist appointments and the vicissitudes of bedtime. (I cannot support the awkward adverbs and comma splices in Magic Tree House. And I know I'm judgey, but those kids are only a year apart.)

The Poison Court
Words today: 918
Words total: 5501
Reason for stopping: end of scene, days without 8 hours of sleep
Mean things: Finally made it to the inconvenient corpse.
Deaths: See above.

Finally murdered someone. Now I need to figure out why he was murdered and by whom. And how that ties in to the larger plot I think I have figured out.

....that there's going to be an Annual Booksale when I get back from WisCon, as there are giant boxes of books all over my house again.

You have been forewarned!

Also, I will be doing an r/Fantasy (that's Reddit) Ask Me Anything on June 5th. Questions may be posted all day in the appropriate thread, and I will answer them in the evening.

Because y'all don't get enough of a chance to listen to me babble...

...take these broken wings and learn to fly.

So I read Chuck Wendig's Blackbirds. Which is being billed as urban fantasy, but which bears about as much resemblance to most urban fantasy as, say, Evil Dead bears to Saw. They're considered the same because the labels are too broad and too flawed, but they're very different creatures. And that? Is amazing.

Blackbirds is the story of Miriam Black, a girl who, by touching you, can bear witness to your death, whenever—and however—it might be destined to occur. Aneurism in five minutes or slow wasting away in fifty years, it don't matter. Death, like the honey badger, doesn't give a fuck, and Miriam, who can't control her powers, is trying her best not to give a fuck either. (Miriam is a lot like Rogue from the X-Men: embittered by a power she didn't ask for, trying to survive in a world that has every reason to shove her in front of the nearest semi.)

The story is simple: girl meets boy, girl foresees boy's death, girl is convinced that she can't change it, boy thinks girl is crazy, hilarity ensues. Only for "boy" read "trucker the size of a small mountain," and for "girl" read "psychopomp death-seer girl just trying to run the roads to her own extinction." I think Miriam would get along well with Rose Marshall; there's a lot about her world that feels like Rose's, but different, and in a wonderful way.

One of the fascinating things about this book is...well. Okay. So I was a really grumpy teenager, right? I felt alienated and lonely and like no one could possibly understand me except for my small group of like-minded friends. This turned into our "freaking the mundanes" phase, which not everyone goes through, but which I think most of us have at least seen. We used to sit on the community college quad at lunch (half my friends were students, the rest of us snuck over from the high school across the street) playing "Penis," where you just keep shouting "PENIS!" louder and louder until you crack up, so you can see the looks on people's faces.

Miriam is like that. Her life is one long game of Penis. She swears, she's inappropriately lewd (which is different from appropriately lewd, although she does that, too), she goes for the shock value, because she wants to keep people away. I think this book contained more instances of the word "fuck" than the unrated cut of Clerks. But here's the kicker:

Chuck Wendig isn't playing Penis with you.

He manages to write a protagonist who's all about the shock, but the book never feels like the author is trying to shock you. He's just telling you what happened. It's a travelogue of tragedy, and it's beautiful and terrible, and it couldn't have happened any other way.

Miriam is a damaged protagonist, and her story is a damaged story, and I loved it. It's like the bastard child of American Gods, Sparrow Hill Road, and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, and you should check it out if you like these things.

Really.

I'm talking today with author Cassie Alexander. Her debut urban fantasy, Nightshifted, is published by St. Martin's Press on May 22nd, with other books in the series forthcoming. I was lucky enough to read an advanced copy of Nightshifted, and I enjoyed it immensely. I love urban fantasy. I love medical realism. Bring those elements together, and I'm one happy reader.



1) Congratulations! First of all, can you tell everyone about Nightshifted and what inspired the book?

Nightshifted is the story of Edie Spence, a nurse who works on a ward for vampire exposed humans -- and I happen to be a nurse in real life, so the medical parts are real.

The first inspiration for the book was me being freaked out by my first year of nursing -- writing Nightshifted helped me to process the almost PTSD you get when you're thrown into a critical care situation that no one could have prepared you for. Your nursing school tries to prepare you, but it can't really, your parents/friends/husband have no idea what you're actually seeing at work, nor do they want to hear about it really, and your coworkers are so blase because they've already seen with and dealt with everything, for years, that it's pretty lonely being new on your own. (Even if you do like weird things, like seeing people's lungs. God help you if you don't like weird things, you'll never make it as a nurse.)

The second inspiration was a doctor blowing me off. When I realized that no one ever believes nightshift, a book was born.

2) I'm curious about your journey to publication. How is it that the book was released in Germany first?

Nightshifted was supposed to be released in the US in Dec 2011, but they pushed it back to June (don't ask me why, no clue ;)) but since everything was turned in Germany, they went ahead with their publication schedule.

3) You must work long hours as a nurse. How do you balance the job and writing time?

Nursing is very physical, it's exhausting, and I do work nightshift, so I lose out on a lot of time sleeping in before shifts, or sleeping up after them. I wrote Nightshifted during my first year as a nurse while I was working full-time, but luckily I'm part-time now, which helps immensely. Other than that, I'm pretty possessive of my writing time, and my husband and cat are very supportive and understand I need to be at the computer a lot ;).

4) Okay, now to shift the topic somewhat. What were your favorite books and authors when you were a kid?

When I was a kid, Andre Norton was like unto a god. Other biggies included CS Lewis, David Eddings, anyone who wrote a Star Trek tie-in novel ;), and when I ran away from home I took a copy of Neuromancer with me.

5) What was your most recent favorite book?

I'm reading Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire right now, and loving it. Any book that can keep me on the elliptical machine for an extra twenty minutes sheer magic.

6) What comes next after the release of Nightshifted?

Moonshifted comes out in late November, and then Shapeshifted next summer, and then after that, we'll see! :D

Thanks, Cassie!

If you want to learn more Cassie, you can take a look at her web site and Twitter. On May 22nd, Nightshifted is available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Powell's, and other booksellers.

I'm actually getting callus on my palms from gripping the Smith bar. Curiously pleased by this.

( Today. )

Incremental progress.