mariness

This has been a surprisingly busy and eventful week, including out of town visitors, the brief loss of a a friend's child at Disney which created a bit of drama (kid has been safely found), the hopefully not brief finding of a new obsession, blackberry wine (why oh internet did you not tell me about this before), the exciting discovery that I had not, after all, tossed out my boots, and more, which means I am now pretty much out of it, but, interrupting that state and a rather alarming amount of laundry for a few quick announcements:

1. Barring any potential weather delays from Hurricane Sandy, aka Frankenstorm, which OH NOES MAY BE KILLING FLIGHTS EVERYWHERE if you believe the media, I should be departing next Monday for World Fantasy Con.

(Don't worry, everyone; I have found my boots, which means that Toronto should be snow free. You can thank me – or curse me – later. I'm thinking curse because I was kinda looking forward to seeing some snow. Which would have certainly happened if my boots had remained hidden. On the other hand if snow does make an appearance Karen Lord will probably kill me, so, all just as well, and wow, could I possibly have mixed up verb tenses any more in this paragraph? I did say that I'm a bit out of it.)

Because my illness is incredibly unpredictable and can strike at any time, and I usually only make it to about half of the con at best, I have not planned any events – readings, panels, dinners, whatever. I'll just be going with the flow. Chances are good, however, that when I am up and about I will be near coffee, at the bar, or in the dealer's room, or have an interest in food in general. (Food!) I also tentatively plan to make my usual graceful and delightful appearance just outside the Tor party which may or may not turn into a graceful appearance inside the Tor party depending upon the state of the door and the crowds.

2. On a writing note, I have another tiny piece forthcoming from Daily Science Fiction squashed there in a month with writers such as Ken Liu and Nina Kiriki Hoffman, so, if you haven't signed up to have these short stories show up in your inbox each morning, and why not, it's free, now seems like a good time.

3. The Edward Eager reread continues over at Tor.com with The Well-Wishers. One more Eager book to go, and then we start a reread that I have been singing about. No, really.

4. And possibly one more announcement coming later today in its own little post.

Over at Tor.com, the long requested Edward Eager reread has finally gotten started. This should hold us through October.

As Tor.com commented:

"Finally a children's book that tells a fun, issue-free story about magic! @Mari_Ness rereads Edward Eager's HALF MAGIC."

Cough. For the record, I'm not deliberately looking for unfun, issue-filled stories without magic. I thought the Freddy the Pig series was just going to be silly fun. Nobody warned me about the dictatorships, the pig cannibalism, and the Communists. (No one ever does.) This series, however, does seem to be on the nicely silly side. So far. Alas, the local library did not have Eager's first two children's books, so I'm only rereading the Magic series (and technically for six of the seven books this is not so much "rereading" as "reading for the first time) but if the series stays this lighthearted (and after what happened with Freddy, I no longer trust any long series) this should be fun.