Music: Money for Nothing, and Your Chicks For Free
… about the two big anthologies that I’m editing with Gardner Dozois for Tor Books. Well, they’re both coming together very nicely, thanks.

For WARRIORS, our huge crossgenre anthology about war, warriors, and the warrior ethos, we’ve got stories in from Robert Silverberg, Joe Haldeman, Cecilia Holland, David Morrell, Lawrence Block, and Robin Hobb. Robin’s novelette is the latest to turn up, a terrific tale called “The Triumph,” about two Romans captured by the Carthaginians during the First Punic War. But Carthage is the least of their problems… Joe Haldeman gave us a story set in the ‘Soldierboy’ universe of his Hugo-winning novel FOREVER PEACE. Vikings, serial killers, the French Foreign Legion, this book is going to have it all.

Meanwhile, the Jack Vance tribute anthology SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH is also moving right along, with fine stories already on hand from Kage Baker, Tanith Lee, Robert Silverberg, Glen Cook, Terry Dowling, and Liz Williams, and manuscripts from Lucius Shepard, Walter Jon Williams, and Jeff Vandermeer expected any day now. The latest arrival is from Kage Baker, who did a Cugel the Clever story that was a delight from start to finish. Don’t know Cugel? Shame on you. In her afterword Kage describes him as a cross between Wile E. Coyote and Harry Flashman, and that’s about right. I’d rank him as one of the great characters of modern fantasy, right up there with Conan the Barbarian, Elric of Melnibone, Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, Jirel of Joiry, and those guys with the hairy feet from Tolkien. A visit from Cugel is like a visit from an old friend… albeit the sort of old friend where you’d do well to count the silverware after he leaves.

Besides the stories, I’ve also been seeing some of the rough sketches for the interior illustratons that Tom Kidd will be doing for Subterranean Press’s signed limited edition of SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH, and those look spectacular as well. Eventually, when we have the final art, I’ll post a few samples here to give you all a taste.

Lots more cool stuff is coming on both books. Diana Gabaldon, Howard Waldrop (twice), Neil Gaiman (twice), Tad Williams, Dan Simmons, Peter S. Beagle, Lucius Shepard, and many more. And I get to read all the stories first. Editing is fun.

So that’s where we stand on that, and thanks for asking.

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Music: Wild Thing
… that the second issue of THE HARD CALL comic is now on sale.

Story and script by Daniel Abraham, art by Eric Battle.

So run down to your favorite comic store and get a copy. Slug girls, serial killers, and Croyd Crenson, what more could you want?

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Music: The Only Living Boy in New York
Parris is off in Kansas City, having fun at ConQuest. I’m here at home, working, working, working. It’s not fair, it isn’t. Waaaah.

I am getting a lot done. Finished an Arya chapter yesterday, and a Sansa chapter the day before. (And before you guys assume I’m writing a chapter a day, I said “finished,” not “wrote.” Large portions of these particular chapters were written years ago. A chapter a day? I wish). Felt good to get them done. Been making a lot of progress with Dany too.

Even so, the time is going by so fast. I grow ever more pessimistic, but I can’t think about dates and deadlines now. My mantra remains the same. One chapter at a time, one page at a time, one sentence at a time.

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Parris is home from Ireland, hurrah, hurrah. And I’m feeling much better than when I last posted, hardly coughing at all. So all that’s good.

Losing a couple weeks to sickness was not good, however. It has put me further behind with everything, and I was already pretty far behind. I have to start thinking about that, or I’ll go mad. One day at a time. One page at a time. One word at a time.

June is coming up too fast.

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Sorry I haven’t posted lately. Haven’t done much of anything this past week except (1) cough, (2) watch the NFL draft, (3) hack up phlegm, (4) cough some more.

Just saw my doc. Looks like I have bronchitis. Got an RX for some antibiotics that should take care of it. But I probably won’t be blogging much in the next week or so. What little energy I do have will be used for work.

Later, guys.

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Here’s your chance to ask me that question you’ve always wanted an answer to.

Starting tomorrow, I will be appearing for the next five days on the Center Stage forum of the Barnes & Noble Book Club. I’ll be logging on at least once each day to field whatever questions my readers and the B&N customers have left for me. Now, I’m not going to promise to answer all of the questions. I will give it my best college try, but a lot depends on how many questions are actually posted. Sometimes this blog generates hundreds of comments in just a few hours, and that’s obviously more than I can handle… but if the number is more manageable, well, I’ll see what I can do.

You’ll find Center Stage at http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/bn/board?board.id=CenterStage if you would like to post a question, or just read the ongoing discussions.

I will actually have three topics for my very own. One for INSIDE STRAIGHT and the Wild Card series, one for A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE and all my other books, and one about my experiences writing for television and film, including BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, TWILIGHT ZONE, and my series-that-never-was, DOORWAYS. So be sure to post your question in the right topic.

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I’m glad so many of you enjoyed my April’s Fool post. Thanks for the laughs.

I’m back home again from the conventions in Blacksburg, Virginia and Madison, Wisconsin, and settling in for the big push. The cons were both great fun, though travel was, as usual, stressful and unpleasant. More and more, I am finding that while I love visiting distant cities and exotic climes, I hate the process of getting there. Would that I could teleport.

Or drive. I still love driving. Give me my RX-7, an open road, some good tunes on my tape deck, and the Babe in the Box to tell me where to go, and I’m a happy traveller. Put me at an airport and my blood pressure starts to build at once.

Ah, well.

Anyway, I’m back now, and not going anywhere until late June, when I will be taking off on my long-anticipated trip to Ireland, Portugal, and Spain. It’s part vacation, part speaking engagement, and part promotional tour. If you live in or near any of those three places, watch the Appearances page on my website for details of when and when I’ll be. We’ll be adding dates as the events are confirmed.

Of course, I need to finish A DANCE WITH DRAGONS before I leave, or else my publishers will hunt me down and kill me. So that’s pretty much all I’ll be doing between now and then. And if I don’t finish, maybe I’ll just stay in Ireland, Portugal, or Spain, where no one will ever be able to find me.

Actually it’s not true that DANCE is all that I’ll be doing. I’ll also be editing the next Wild Cards books, SUICIDE KINGS, co-editing WARRIORS and SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH with Gardner Dozois, finishing the third Dunk & Egg novella, which is oh-so-close, and of course watching the NFL draft. Without me glued to the television, how will the Giants and the Jets know who to pick? But never mind…

I don’t know how much I will be posting here, or updating my website in general, however. The News page is woefully out of date, I know, and the pictures of babies, puppies, and cute kittens for the fan page are piling up… but for what it’s worth, when my webpage isn’t getting update, that’s usually a sign that I’m lost in my writing, with no energy left at the end of the day for much else. So that’s good.

Oh, and then there’s Center Stage. More on that in a moment.

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Some days the muse is with you, some days she’s not.

After years of struggle, I have finally figured out how to wrap up A SONG OF ICE & FIRE. As most of you know, it has been taking me longer and longer to deliver these books. The thing is, I got the poor Stark family into such deep trouble that I could no longer see any good, plausible way to get them out. I had written my poor characters into a deep, deep cave and the light was going out. No wonder I was having trouble. Why, I had created problems so severe that there was no way the Starks could hope to overcome them. Winterfell was doomed.

But today I had a brainstorm, and now the way is clear.

The problem was, I was taking my lead from J.R.R. Tolkien. JRRT was a master, of course, but he was sort of obsessive as well, when you come down to it. Middle Earth, Middle Earth, elves, orcs, dwarfs, that was all he could think about. I needed a broader perspective, so today I decided, the hell with Tolkien, I will take my inspiration instead from such giants as Stephen King, Isaac Asimov, and Robert A. Heinlein. King tied all of his work together in the conclusion of the DARK TOWER series. Asimov joined his Robot series to his Foundation series in the last books he wrote before his death. RAH, the first Grandmaster, the DEAN of Science Fiction, had all his protagonists get together for a cocktail party in THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST. So why should I limit myself to one world and one set of characters?

Winterfell is saved! The Wild Cards are coming to the rescue!

It’s perfect. Melisandre will open the gate with one of her fire spells, and from a world beyond the heroes will come through to save the Starks and rescue all of Westeros. The Others cannot hope to stand against Popinjay, Jetboy, and the Great and Powerful Turtle. So what if they can raise the dead? So can Hoodoo Mama. And what evil knight of Westeros could hope to match blades against Lohengrin armored in his ghost steel, with his glowing force sword in his hand? And those dragons… sure, they’re pretty fierce, but little Dragon Huntress can match them with her stuffy Puffy, and she can pull out Cthulhu too! Modular Man, Cap’n Trips, Yeoman, Carnifex, Bubbles, Curveball, Dr. Tachyon, Water Lily, Fortunato, Troll, Midnight Angel, and the rest… they’ll set right all that’s wrong in Westeros and do it in short order.

Why didn’t I see this earlier?

The muse is good.

The Wild Cards are coming to Westeros, and all is saved!!!

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Back from Technicon in Virginia last night, late (insert rant about airlines and TSA here). Had a great time.

Off to Oddcon in Madison, Wisconsin at the crack of dawn on Wednesday (insert rant about airlines and the TSA here). Expect to have a great time again.

Madly trying to catch up today and tomorrow. I was away from my computer three days, and 450 emails accumulated in my absence. Sigh.

If you’re within travelling distance of Madison, come see me there. Later.

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