New Mexico needs rain. I know, I know. New Mexico almost always needs rain. So much so that Parris has taught the children of her Irish friends to chant, “Rain, rain go away, go and rain on Santa Fe.” This is a dry state at the best of times, and the last few years we have been in the middle of a long drought. Not much snow in winter, not much snowmelt in spring, raging wildfires during the long, hot, dry summer. So rain is much to be desired.

But did we have to get so much of it just now?

It has been raining for a week and a half now. Sometimes steadily for hours, sometimes fiercely in a sudden deluge. Most days, and always at night. Which would be fine, except that I am plunk in the middle of major home renovations, including adding on a new, pitched roof to replace my old flat tar-and-gravel “pueblo style” roof. So they took the old roof off and carried it away, but they haven’t put the new one on yet. I have tarps on top of my home, and we’ve had wind as well as rain, so they are doing a lot of flapping. Water is coming in. And the contractor says he can’t put the new roof on until the rain stops.

That’s at the house I live in (usually). At the moment Parris and I are living across the street in the house that is (usually) my office. That one has a roof, but it’s a flat Santa Fe style roof, and so of course it’s leaking.

Arrrgh.

All you kids in Ireland, STOP THAT DAMNED CHANTING!!!

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I do have the best of intentions, honest. How hard can it be to update your blog regularly? Even when it's Not A Blog? Sigh. Too hard for me, it would seem. I know there are folks who do it every day, but…

Actually, I have added new entries to this journal half a dozen times since the last post you read here. In my head, anyway. It's just getting the words down on pap… er, phosphor… that proves to be the problem. Of course, getting the words down has always been the hard part. If it wasn't hard, everyone would be a writer.

Let's see, I went to Marcon in Columbus, Ohio last month, did a few panels, read a chapter from A DANCE WITH DRAGONS, had some drinks with some of my readers. The Marcon folks were great hosts. On the way back, I stopped in Chicago to visit with my old friend and one-time collaborator Lisa Tuttle, who now lives in Scotland but was passing through Chicago herself on the way back from Wiscon. We had a great time catching up, and visited my favorite restaurant in the world, the Greek Islands in Greektown, where we ate flaming cheese and shouted "Opaa!" (There are some who will tell you that Oprah Winfrey has grown so huge in Chicago that the waiters in the Greektown eateries now shout "Oprah!" when they set the cheese on fire, but I can testify that it isn't true). I also took an el ride up to my old stomping grounds in Uptown one afternoon, and was startled by the changes. The apartments I lived in on Margate Terrace and Argyle are still there, but that's about it. The grocery stores I shopped in, the bar where I drank beer and played that high-tech videogame Pong, the newstand where I bought my comic books and the first issue of ANALOG to feature my story on the cover, the diners where I used to have my breakfast, even the friendly neighborhood titty bars where I used to… ah… do sociological research, all of them are gone. Argyle is nothing but Oriental groceries and Vietnamese restaurants now. The saddest part was seeing the boarded up ruins of the Uptown and Riviera movie houses, where I sat in the dark and saw so many films back in the early 70s. The Uptown in particular needs to be saved. It was one of Chicago's largest and grandest movie palaces. Anyway, after I got back, I figured I'd write a trip report about Columbus and Chicago for Not A Blog. But I didn't.

Here in Santa Fe, our home renovations have been going ahead like… well, I was going to say, "gangbusters," but "housebusters" would be more accurate. Three-quarters of what we own is in storage, and the construction crew has ripped the roof off our house, torn out the ceilings and most of the walls on floors two and one-and-a-half, filled several huge dumpsters with chunks of what used to be our home. They keep telling us they are going to put it all back together twice as nice as before, but some days I wonder. Meanwhile, Parris and I are living in my office across the street, which isn't nearly big enough for the two of us and Caligula and Augustus too. Another three months and it will all be done, they say. I hope so. I was thinking I would write a long piece for Not A Blog about the trials and tribulations of home renovation. But of course I didn't.

I have had various visitors since my last update here, most recently Howard Waldrop, who passed through on his way to the Rio Hondo writer's workshop in Taos, and again on the way back. Howard's visits never last long enough. He and I have known each other since 1963, when I bought BRAVE & BOLD #28 from him (first JLA, donchaknow) for a quarter and we began to correspond. We were both in high school in those days, writing for comics fanzines. I was writing superhero stories in prose, and he was writing post-holocaust sword & sorcery about a hero called The Wanderer and "the Chronicles of Chim-Wazle." I keep telling Howard that I want that next Wanderer story, but he never listens. He's writing stuff about a guy named Tom Purdue instead… (or at least that's the story he told me to tell). I thought I might put something up here about Howard and his visit. But I didn't.

Oddly enough, I am still writing superhero stories in prose. Or editing them, at least. One of the BIG news items since my last update here is the rebirth of WILD CARDS, which I am very excited about. The WILD CARDS series has been a part of my life since 1985 (though admittedly there was one seven-year hiatus in there), and some of the characters go all the way back to 1983, when some of the New Mexico gang created them for a RPG called SUPERWORLD. It's a world I love, and one I feared that I might have lost when our last publisher went bankrupt, but Tor Books stepped in and saved the day, and WILD CARDS is coming back bigger and better than ever, with new stories, new writers, and new characters. I thought about writing about that here, but instead I wrote about it for my News page. So go read the details there… and then go out and read a WILD CARDS book, please. I promise you, it's good stuff.

Parris and I saw Al Gore's AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH last week. It is a powerful and persuasive statement, and surprisingly entertaining, and Gore exudes so much warmth and intelligence that I still wonder how the country could have chosen George W. Bush instead in 2000… oh, wait, I forgot, we DIDN'T! Just those rascals on the Supreme Court. Speaking of W (must we?), I see that when he was asked if he intended to see Gore's film, he replied, "Doubt it," with one of his patented monkey smirks. You know, it is irritating enough that this president is so ignorant about so many things, but what really infuriates me is that he WALLOWS in his ignorance and seems to take great joy in it. No, of course he is not going to see AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH. He might have learned something. Anyway, I did think about writing some political stuff here. But I didn't.

I could go on. There were a whole bunch of other subjects I considered adding to Not A Blog. Some of them I even wrote in my head. (Ah, the stuff I write in my head… )

Of course, judging by my emails, very few of you would have cared much about my visit to Chicago, or Howard's visit here, or my home renovations, or even global warming (you SHOULD care about global warming, however, and if you don't know why, go see the Gore film, Al explains it much better than I could). All my emails are about A DANCE WITH DRAGONS. I made the mistake of saying on my Update page that I would update again in April, and I didn't. Mea culpa. The thing is, I have posted several updates here, and I thought that would suffice, but it would appear that a good percentage of the folks who visit my website go straight to Update and never check out any of the other pages or links, including this one.

I promise, I am going to update Update real soon now.

Meanwhile, for those who do read this page… yes, I am still working on A DANCE WITH DRAGONS, and yes, I still hope to deliver it this fall, or by the end of the year at the latest.

I also have other news about A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE. A couple of things, actually, that I think will please and excite fans of the series. Unfortunately, I can't talk about them yet. Watch my News page, though. I should have a few big announcements in the next few months.

I hope I will be back here for another Not A Blog before that. But I'm not promising.

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Has it really been more than a month since my last update? Hard to believe. Sometimes I don’t know where the days go.

Parris flew off to Ireland a few weeks ago for a well-deserved vacation, and left me here chained to the computer to work on A DANCE WITH DRAGONS. Very cruel of her, I must say, but I am getting some writing done, so I suppose it worked. All the same, the two houses seem very empty without her. More so since we are moving all the furnishings and most of the Stuff out of the main house so we can finally begin our long-planned and much-postponed renovations, which I fully expect to make my life a living hell for the next four months. Emptying the place out has been a major project in and of itself. It is staggering how much Stuff we have. Rooms and rooms and rooms of Stuff, books and clothes and books and furniture and books and music(vinyl) and books and music (CDs) and books and keepsakes and books and mementos and books and more clothing and books and more furnishings and books and… my unread shelf alone filled twenty-two boxes. (And those are just MY unread books, Parris has her own). I have enough unread books to keep me reading for several decades. I never need to buy another book. But somehow I suspect I will.

The end is almost in sight, though. We’ve filled up three storage lockers, and I am now living mostly in my “office house,” across the street from the main house. It’s crammed to the gills and chaotic, needless to say, but I suppose I am lucky. Not everybody has a second house across the street to take refuge in while their home is being renovated. Checking into a hotel for four months might be more pleasant in some regards, but I doubt that I’d be able to get much work done in a hotel room, so I’ll just grit my teeth and keep repeating, “It will be over in four months, it will be over in four months.”

Lots of other stuff going on that I can’t talk about yet… but do keep an eye on my news page. There are some exciting projects coming down the pike that I expect to be able to announce shortly. (I never like to announce anything until the contracts are signed. Superstition, I suppose, but it has served me in good stead. It’s embarrassing to tell the world about some exciting new deal or book or spin-off, and then have the thing fall apart on you).

Oh, and I suppose you want to know how the DANCE is coming? Work continues. I finished the revisions on the Jon Snow chapters that I was talking about last month, and moved on to Tyrion for a while, but just now I am working on a new viewpoint character, and a chapter set in steamy harbor of Old Volantis. Where I shall be returning, first thing tomorrow.

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I meant to write an account of my recent trip to Boskone and New York, really I did, but somehow I haven’t found the time. Sigh. Sorry about that. Now you know why I call this “Not a Blog.” I will never understand how some folks find the time and energy to update their blogs daily. For what it’s worth, I was never very good at keeping a journal either.

With no more travel on my immediate horizons (there’s Marcon in Ohio over Memorial Day, and then nothing until the summer), I have finally been able to settle down and get back into A DANCE WITH DRAGONS. That’s where most of my time and energy has gone of late. For the last week or so I have been back at the Wall with Jon Snow and the men of the Night’s Watch. Jon, I think, will be one of the main beneficiaries of my splitting A FEAST FOR CROWS in two. I will have more room to deal with Jon and Stannis and the wildlings and the rest, which will allow me to flesh out their storylines more and bring them to a better resolution… but it’s more than that. Although I had “completed” something on the order of five Jon chapters before deciding to divide the book, I was never really happy with them, and rereading them now has reinforced my feelings. They need to be much stronger, and I believe I see how to do that now. Sometimes putting things on the back burner can work wonders. That where the muse lives (or the moose, as Parris sometimes calls her).

Oh, and I’ve also come up with a new title for the seventh (and final, I hope, I hope, I hope) volume of the series — A DREAM OF SPRING. I like the sound of that a lot better than A TIME FOR WOLVES, which has been my working title for book seven up to now, and I also think it gives a better sense of the book that I want to write. So — A DANCE WITH DRAGONS, then THE WINDS OF WINTER, then A DREAM OF SPRING. Shouldn’t take me long (hah).

Other than that, well… I’m glad THE SOPRANOS is back, I haven’t made up my mind about BIG LOVE yet, and I miss ROME and wish the second season was starting next month. Saw V FOR VENDETTA last night with Parris and Melinda and Carl, and enjoyed it. Parris is still packing up our stuff so that our home renovations can begin. It has taken much longer than anticipated. We have WAY too much stuff. Comes of being packrats and living in the same house since 1983, I suppose.

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The Hugo ballot is out, and A FEAST FOR CROWS is one of the finalists in the “Best Novel” category. Thanks, to everyone who nominated me… and to those who didn’t as well, so long as you nominated someone. We need more people to take part the nominating process. Win or lose, it IS an honor just to be on the ballot.

I was also thrilled to see that Howard Waldrop is up in Novelette. Howard has few peers as a short fiction writer, and is long overdue for a Hugo. Maybe this year…

Elsewise, though, the ballot does not thrill me. I was disappointed that the SOUTH PARK’s “Trapped in the Closet” did not make the list in Short Form/ Drama, particularly in light of current efforts to make certain the episode is never shown again. And how Alan Lee and John Howe can continue to be overlooked in the Best Artist category, year after year after year after year, never ceases to astonish me.

Here’s the full list of nominees, courtesy of the good folks at LACon IV:

Best Novel
(430 ballots cast)
Learning the World, Ken MacLeod (Orbit; Tor)
A Feast for Crows, George R.R. Martin (Voyager; Bantam Spectra)
Old Man’s War, John Scalzi (Tor)
Accelerando, Charles Stross (Ace; Orbit)
Spin, Robert Charles Wilson (Tor)

Best Novella
(243 ballots cast)
Burn, James Patrick Kelly (Tachyon)
“Magic for Beginners”, Kelly Link (Magic for Beginners, Small Beer
Press; F&SF September 2005)
“The Little Goddess”, Ian McDonald (Asimov’s June 2005)
“Identity Theft”, Robert J. Sawyer (Down These Dark Spaceways, SFBC)
“Inside Job”, Connie Willis (Asimov’s January 2005)

Best Novelette
(207 ballots cast)
“The Calorie Man”, Paolo Bacigalupi (F&SF October/November 2005)
“Two Hearts”, Peter S. Beagle (F&SF October/November 2005)
“TelePresence”, Michael A. Burstein (Analog July/August 2005)
“I, Robot!, Cory Doctorow (The Infinite Matrix February 15, 2005)
“The King of Where-I-Go”, Howard Waldrop (SCI FICTION December 7,
2005)

Best Short Story
(278 ballots cast)
“Seventy-Five Years”, Michael A. Burstein (Analog January/February
2005)
“The Clockwork Atom Bomb”, Dominic Green (Interzone May/June 2005)
“Singing My Sister Down”, Margo Lanagan (Black Juice, Allen & Unwin;
Eos)
“Tk’tk’tk”, David D. Levine (Asimov’s March 2005)
“Down Memory Lane”, Mike Resnick (Asimov’s April/May 2005)

Best RelatedBook
(197 ballots cast)
Transformations: The Story of the Science Fiction Magazines from 1950
to 1970, Mike Ashley (Liverpool)
The SEX Column and Other Misprints, David Langford(Cosmos)
Science Fiction Quotations edited, Gary Westfahl(Yale)
Storyteller: Writing Lessons and More from 27 Years of the Clarion
Writers’ Workshop, Kate Wilhelm (Small Beer Press)
Soundings: Reviews 1992_1996, Gary K. Wolfe (Beccon)

Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
(364 ballots cast)
Batman Begins Story, David S. Goyer. Screenplay, Christopher Nolan
and David S. Goyer. Based on the character created, Bob Kane.
Directed, Christopher Nolan. (Warner Bros.)
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Screenplay, Ann Peacock and Andrew Adamson and Christopher Markus &
Stephen McFeely. Based on the novel, C.S. Lewis. Directed, Andrew
Adamson. (Walt Disney Pictures/Walden Media)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire Screenplay, Steven Kloves. Based
on the novel, J.K. Rowling. Directed, Mike Newell. (Warner Bros.)
Serenity Written & Directed, Joss Whedon. (Universal Pictures/Mutant
Enemy, Inc.)
Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were_Rabbit Screenplay, Steve Box
& Nick Park and Bob Baker and Mark Burton. Directed, Nick Park &
Steve Box. (Dreamworks Animation/Aardman Animation).

Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form
(261 ballots cast)
Battlestar Galactica !œPegasus! Written, Anne Cofell Saunders.
Directed, Michael Rymer. (NBC Universal/British Sky Broadcasting)
Doctor Who !œDalek! Written, Robert Shearman. Directed, Joe Ahearne.
(BBC Wales/BBC1)
Doctor Who !œThe Empty Child! & !œThe Doctor Dances! Written, Steven
Moffat. Directed, James Hawes. (BBC Wales/BBC1)
Doctor Who !œFather’s Day! Written, Paul Cornell. Directed, Joe
Ahearne. (BBC Wales/BBC1)
Jack-Jack Attack Written & Directed, Brad Bird. (Walt Disney
Pictures/Pixar Animation)
Lucas Back in Anger Written, Phil Raines and Ian Sorensen. Directed,
Phil Raines. (Reductio Ad Absurdum Productions)
Prix Victor Hugo Awards Ceremony (Opening Speech and Framing
Sequences). Written and performed, Paul McAuley and Kim Newman.
Directed, Mike & Debby Moir. (Interaction Events)
(There are seven nominees due to a tie for fifth place)

Best Professional Editor
(293 ballots cast)
Ellen Datlow (SCI FICTION and anthologies)
David G. Hartwell (Tor Books; Year’s Best SF)
Stanley Schmidt (Analog)
Gordon Van Gelder (F&SF)
Sheila Williams (Asimov’s)

Best Professional Artist
(230 ballots cast)
Jim Burns
Bob Eggleton
Donato Giancola
Stephan Martiniere
John Picacio
Michael Whelan
(There are six nominees due to a tie for fifth place)

Best Semiprozine
(219 ballots cast)
Ansible edited, Dave Langford
Emerald City edited, Cheryl Morgan
Interzone edited, Andy Cox
Locus edited, Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong_Wong, & Liza Groen Trombi
The New York Review of Science Fiction edited, Kathryn Cramer, David
G. Hartwell & Kevin J. Maroney

Best Fanzine
(176 ballots cast)
Banana Wings edited, Claire Brialey & Mark Plummer
Challenger edited, Guy H. Lillian III
Chunga edited, Andy Hooper, Randy Byers & carl juarez
File 770 edited, Mike Glyer
Plokta edited, Alison Scott, Steve Davies & Mike Scott

Best Fan Writer
(202 ballots cast)
Claire Brialey
John Hertz
Dave Langford
Cheryl Morgan
Steven H Silver

Best Fan Artist
(154 ballots cast)
Brad Foster
Teddy Harvia
Sue Mason
Steve Stiles
Frank Wu

John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer of 2004 or 2005
[Not a Hugo Sponsored, Dell Magazines]
(186 ballots cast)
K.J. Bishop (2nd year of eligibility)
Sarah Monette (2nd year of eligibility)
Chris Roberson (2nd year of eligibility)
Brandon Sanderson (1st year of eligibility)
John Scalzi (1st year of eligibility)
Steph Swainston (2nd year of eligibility)
(There are six nominees due to a tie for fifth place)

There were 533 valid nominating ballots received from L.A.con IV and
Interaction members (434 electronically; 99 by mail and fax).

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Just popping up with a quick reminder that Hugo nominations close on Friday.

Many people vote for the Hugo Awards. Relatively few nominate. If you would like your voice to be heard, this is your chance. You do have to be a member of either the last worldcon (Glasgow) or the next one (LA). You can even nominate online, at http://laconiv.org/2006/hugos/hugoform.htm.

I made some suggestions as to worthy nominees a couple of posts down. Your own favorites may be very different. No matter. Nominate. The Hugo Award is only as meaningful as we make it.

I’ve been intending to post a report on my recent trip to Boskone and New York, but as usual I have been swamped since I got back. Maybe in the next day or so. It was a great trip, though. Boskone was fun, as ever, and the week in NYC was as exciting as it was exhausting. All sorts of interesting new books and projects are in the wind, and I expect I’ll be telling you about some of them when and if they become real.

(And no, I am NOT going to forget about A DANCE WITH DRAGONS. That’s still my number one priority, and will remain so until it’s done).

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It frightens me a little to realize that there have now been forty Super Bowls. I remember watching the first one in the dorm lounge of the North Shore Hotel in Evanston, Illinois, back when I was in college. I watched the second, third, and fourth in that same room. Damn, but the years do fly by…

Congratulations to the Pittsburgh Steelers and their fans. It was not the best of Super Bowls, but it was by no means the worst either. A halfway decent game, which can’t be said of all of them. And it was nice to see Jerome Bettis go out as a champion. Though he never played for either of my teams, I have always liked the Bus. He seems a class guy, a real team guy, and you like to see someone like that go out on top. I hope the same sort of ending awaits my own favorite guys, Curtis Martin (Jets) and Tiki Barber (Giants), somewhere down the line.

So another NFL season is now done, which means that Sunday becomes a work day for me once again. That should please everyone waiting for A DANCE WITH DRAGONS.

I am already looking forward to the NFL draft in April, however. The Jets have the fourth overall pick, in a draft where all the experts claim there are three great players. Sigh. Myself, I’d be happy if the Jets emerged with the big offensive lineman, D’Brickashaw Ferguson, someone to open holes for Curtis and protect Chad… always assuming that Curtis and Chad are still going to be with the team next season, which is by no means certain. The Jets have a new coach, after all, and new coaches traditionally like to clean house. If Reggie Bush falls to the four slot, that would be cool as well… but he won’t, and I don’t want the Jets to trade up to get him. I am still rooting for Chad Pennington to make a full recovery from his shoulder surgery and return to the form he flashed in 2002, so I don’t especially want the Jets to take either of the high-rated QBs, Leinart or Young. Based on their record, however, whatever selection the Jets make will turn out to be have been the wrong one… I swear, they have been under a cloud ever since Joe Willie sold their souls for that victory in Super Bowl III. Now that was a SUPER Bowl…

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LACon has sent out its Hugo nominating ballots. If you’re a member of the con, please nominate. If you’re not, but you intend on going to LA this August, this would be a good time to join. Then you could nominate as well. The Hugos are the most important and prestigious awards in the world of SF and fantasy, and this is your chance to participate in them. You do NOT have to have read every book or short story published during the past year to be able to nominate. Even if you have only read one or two things, but you think they were Hugo worthy, please do nominate them. You do NOT have to nominate in all the categories either.

I have always felt that the nominations are the most important part of the process. It IS an honor just to be nominated, after all, and if you are not nominated, you can’t win. Also, compared to the final ballot, relatively few people choose to take part in the nominating process, so one or two ballots can make the difference between being a Hugo nominee, or not. This is especially important for new writers and first time nominees. Once you get that first nomination the others come easier, since the voters tend to look back at previous years when trying to decide what names to write in. But that first nomination is hard…

Who you choose to nominate, of course, is entirely up to you. It is a secret ballot, after all.

However, I do have a few suggestions…

In the Best Artist category, I think it is a crime and a shame that I never seem to see the names of JOHN HOWE or ALAN LEE on the final ballot. There are no better fantasy artists anywhere in the world. The same five or six artists tend to be nominated in this category every year, and they are all very talented, to be sure… but it is past time that Howe and Lee were on the ballot as well. I’m nominating both of them.

The Best Editor category also tends to be dominated by the same group of “Usual Suspects.” All great editors, and well deserving of their nominations… but there are others working in our field, equally good, who have never gotten the recognition they deserve. One of them is my own editor, Bantam’s ANNE LESLEY GROELL. I urge you to consider her name when you are filling out your ballot.

No doubt the Best Dramatic Presentation/ Short Form category will be dominated by episodes of BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, STARGATE, and the other ongoing SF dramas. That’s cool, but sometimes SF shows up in places where you don’t expect it. On SOUTH PARK, for example. I am going to nominate the hilarious episode called TRAPPED IN THE CLOSET, all about the evil alien overlord Xamu and L. Ron Hubbard. Join me. If we get SOUTH PARK on the ballot, maybe Matt and Trey will show up at the con…

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My Canadian book tour went very well, I thought. The bookshops did a great job, and we had good turnouts at all the events, especially those in Toronto and Vancouver. I had the chance to meet a thousand or so of my readers, and also managed to fit in a few late dinners with some old friends. Stayed at some great hotels as well. The Royal York in Toronto is full of fond memories for me, and the Empress in Victoria has to be one of the grandest places that’s ever let me through the doors.

All the same, I am glad to be home. I’ve spent most of the summer and fall touring and travelling, and it seems as though half my life has been lived in hotels and airports (I hate airports and airport security, as I am reminded every time I travel). I’ve signed in London, King’s Lynn, Norwich, Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham, Nottingham, Colchester, Woking, Basingstoke, Portsmouth, Glasgow, Nashville, Lexington, Cincinnati, Dayton, Ann Arbor, Indianapolis, Madison, New York City, Petaluma, San Francisco, Berkeley, Half Moon Bay, Huntington Beach, San Diego, Seattle, Denver, Albuquerque, Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Victoria, and Vancouver. I have also done the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. and the Lucca Games & Comics Show in Tuscany. All swell places, to be sure, and I had a wonderful time meeting my fans and signing their books, cards, and games… but it’s past time that I returned to Westeros. I am looking forward to signing less and writing more during the rest of 2006.

I am still getting emails from readers who could not make it to any of my myriad appearances, but would like an autographed copy of A FEAST FOR CROWS. No, I’m afraid I do not have any copies of the book for sale myself, and I don’t expect that I will for several years. However, the good folks at the Signed Page tell me that they still have twenty-five signed copies of FEAST remaining, available through their website at http://www.signedpage.com/ . Some of the bookstores that hosted my events may also have autographed copies for sale. Try Joseph Beth in Lexington, Kentucky, the Tattered Cover in Denver, the University Book Store in Seattle (ask for Duane), or Page One Books in Albuquerque; I signed large amounts of stock at all of them.

On other fronts, my beloved New York Giants exited the NFL playoffs ignominiously, courtesy of the Carolina Panthers (probably just as well that I was flying to Toronto during that game, it would only have broken my heart), my beloved New York Jets lost their coach courtesy of the Kansas City Chiefs and hired a Kid Coach in his stead, and George W. Bush contines to subvert my beloved Constitution, spying on American citizens and supporting torture in Guantanamo. Sigh. And just for a little extra stress, Parris and I are about to begin some major and much needed renovations to our house in Santa Fe, so our lives are going to be torn up and stored in boxes for most of the next four months. Renovations are hell, everyone assures me… but I have an escape. While our roof is being torn off in Santa Fe, I plan to be off walking the Wall with Jon Snow, or visiting Dany and her dragons in Meereen. Or so I hope….

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Well, another year is done and gone. Have to say, 2005 was a terrific year… for me personally, at least (not for some of my friends, alas, and certainly not for America and our poor abused constitution, but that’s a different discussion). I finally finished and delivered A FEAST FOR CROWS (at long last, I know), saw it published, and watched in astonishment and delight as it climbed up to #1 on all the bestseller lists. I had some great tours as well, and met thousands of my readers.

Seems as though I just returned from my US tour, but already the road is calling again. On Sunday I leave for Toronto, for the first leg of my Canadian signing tour (details and dates on my Appearances page). And yes, my flights conflict with the playoff game between my Giants and the Carolina Panthers, damn it. No help for that. I will just need to grit my teeth and visualize Tiki running. Parris will TIVO the game for me, though I don’t know that I will able to stop myself from hearing the results. That worked on my English tour, since the Brits don’t give a damn about American football, but Canada is different… and these are the playoffs.

I would love to see a Manning v. Manning SuperBowl, but I don’t believe it can happen. Not this year.

All the travelling and promotion plus the usual demands of the holidays have not left me with much time and energy for writing of late, but I hope to rectify that soon. I have a big chunk of a new Dunk & Egg novella that I should be able to finish with a good solid week of work… and then I’ve got some dragons waiting for a dance. We’ll see how all that goes.

Meanwhile, I will be seeing some of you in the Great White North, I hope. ’till then…

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