This Is My Secret: The Blog and Website of Writer Kristin Cashore

Reminder that Marie Rutkoski (as of today, a NYT best-selling author! Yay! Congrats Marie!) and I are doing an event at Harvard Book Store, Friday April 8 at 7pm. Join us if you can!

And here's a treat for you: a cover of my favorite song from the musical Hamilton, called "Wait For It." In the musical, this song is performed by Aaron Burr (played by Leslie Odom, Jr. on Broadway). This outstanding cover is performed by the Musicality Vocal Ensemble at Curie High School on Chicago's southwest side. Thanks, Phil :o)

Next Friday, April 8, come to the Harvard Book Store at 7PM to see Marie Rutkoski and me, in honor of the release (yesterday) of the third book in her Winner's trilogy, The Winner's Kiss! I expect we'll both be reading, then chatting with each other, then chatting with you. It'll be fun, and Marie's new book is WONDERFUL -- come and see us!


In other news, here are a couple sweet songs I've been enjoying lately. As always, if you can't see the videos, go to my Blog Actual.

Fiona Apple, "Hot Knife"

Regina Spektor, "Eet"

In the category of It's All Relative, it's 41°F (5°C) and raining today, I was just outside, I was wearing a light long-sleeve shirt and jeans but no coat, no hat, no scarf, no longjohns, and it was GLORIOUS. It's not supposed to snow again until tomorrow. :D?It turns out I was wrong about two things about the event last night. First of all, it was totally snowing. Secondly, it was also snowing in New York, which meant that poor Marie spent an hour or so sitting on her plane on the runway before they finally canceled her flight. Marie was not able to make it to last night's event. Waaah! I did my best to read from The Winner's Crime and talk up her beautiful series. Happy book birthday, Marie. Here in Cambridge, we miss you. Thank you, everyone, for coming out on a snowy night!Via Rebecca Rabinowitz, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/CFIDS/ME has a new name: SEID, systemic exertion intolerance disease. It's also the focus of some new attention. This is wonderful news fo…

This is your friendly reminder that tomorrow evening, Tuesday, March 3 at 7 PM, Marie Rutkoski and I will be at the Harvard Book Store for a Q&A and signing. Marie will read briefly from her new book, The Winner's Crime. I think I'm going to read (VERY briefly) from Fire. Then we will brilliantly pepper each other with brilliant questions before turning it over to the brilliant audience. We will all be very smart and incisive. You don't want to miss it. And at the moment, it's not even snowing, nor is it supposed to be snowing Tuesday evening. Hope to see you there!

Looking ahead, my MIT Communications Forum is March 19. I'm happily doing some reading and rereading in preparation for that, as well. At the moment, it's Andrew Smith's Grasshopper Jungle. Next up, Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now.

It snowed again yesterday, heavy, wet flakes this time. I walked home from a friend's house late last night and the falling snow was sparkling; the mountains of snow lining the streets and consuming people's yards were sparkling. This winter is like being trapped inside a snow globe. It is a little bit claustrophobic, but it's also kind of magical. Many, many cars are still completely encased in mounds of snow. We're expecting a blizzard this weekend. Tonight it will be 0°F (-18°C) and I have bedazzled my fingernails for a party.

On Tuesday, March 3,Marie Rutkoski is coming to town and she and I will be doing an event together at 7 PM at the Harvard Book Store. Yay! Do come! The event is to celebrate the release of Marie's book The Winner's Crime, sequel to The Winner's Curse, both of which are SO WONDERFUL, and I'm so excited to talk about it with her. The event is also to celebrate the release of ABSOLUTELY NOTHING I HAVE WRITTEN, because I am SO SLO…

There's a new book coming out on March 4 that I'm wildly excited about, because it is just so wonderfully excellently super-good… It's called The Winner's Curse and Marie Rutkoski wrote it. Those of you who read my blog carefully know that Marie is a dear friend of mine, so I wouldn't blame you if now you're thinking, Oh, sure, she's going to say it's wonderful, because her friend wrote it – or even, Oh, sure, she's going to think it's wonderful, because her friend wrote it. This sort of dilemma arises when one's friend writes an amazing book: How to convince others that the book itself is amazing and I'm not just speaking out of love for my friend? Well, how about I bring in Kirkus Reviews to help me. From their starred review of The Winner's Curse:

"Rich characterization, exquisite worldbuilding and rock-solid storytelling make this a fantasy of unusual intelligence and depth.... Precise details and elegant prose make this wo…