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

First, it's come to my attention that Amazon has the prologue and first chapter of Bitterblue online, for anyone who wants a sneak peek.

MORE IMPORTANTLY: As you may or may not know, in conjunction with the soon-to-be-released Hunger Games movie, THERE IS NAIL POLISH. I've always been led to believe that the ultimate goal for an author is the movie deal. Now I understand that the movie deal is merely a MEANS TO A MUCH HIGHER END: NAIL POLISH. And listen, I think my books would make for some great nail polish. There are so many bright and sparkly colors! While I was trying to convince a friend of this the other day, she mentioned that Bitterblue couldn't really pull off nail polish. I must agree. (Um, if you are BONKERS about spoilers, don't read the next sentence, but really it's a joke, not a spoiler, and would be understood by anyone who'd read the first few chapters:) Helda would do Bitterblue's nails and send her off to bed, then in the morning, Bitterb…

The Dowager Countess: Wasn't there a masked ball in Paris when cholera broke out? Half the guests were dead before they left the ballroom.

The Earl: Thank you, Mama. That's cheered us up no end.

(From Downton Abbey)Spoiler warning: Assume that all the following sections contain spoilers for whatever TV show the section is about.

Downton Abbey.
This is not the same show it was last season. Characters I knew then, I don't know anymore… Like Matthew, like Edith, like Branson (would someone please punch him for putting down Sybil's nursing work?); I'm even a little bit lost with Mary. And it's not that characters can't change. It's only that we need to understand what made them change. Otherwise they stop being characters and become tools for advancing/manipulating the plot.

I feel like it's a little bit more soap opera-y this season. Lavinia dies of a case of "Spanish flu with broken heart complications," for example. Seriously? She learns t…

I'm going to be away from home for 31 of the next 40 days, which is always lovely once I'm on the road but COMPLETELY BONKERS before I go... especially this time, because I need to bring so much stuff and so many books. I mentioned my e-book reader in a previous post... I much prefer reading physical books -- there's no contest -- I should write a post sometime about all the things I find frustrating about e-books -- but I do have an e-book reader, pretty much solely for travel, and I can't overstate how much easier it makes life. I'm in research mode for the next three weeks and will probably be reading as many as 15 to 20 books, not to mention a few manuscripts, and all of it weighs less than a pound and takes up practically no space at all, since it's on the e-book reader. As it is, I'm still going to be lugging a lot of books and paper, but at least I won't be a walking bookcase.

Anyway, as I write this, I'm in travel prep mode, so I'm not a…

I am reaching but I fall
and the stars are black and cold
as I stare into the void
of a world that cannot hold.
I'll escape now from that world,
from the world of Jean Valjean.
There is nowhere I can turn.
There is no way to go on --
I suppose I should warn y'all that this post contains spoilers to the plot of Les Misérables (though nothing you wouldn't be able to figure out by looking at the song list). So. Bear that in mind.

I currently have a favorite six seconds in Les Mis. It's in the song "Javert's Suicide," the version I've been listening to is the original London cast recording with Roger Allam playing Javert, and the six seconds is the final "on" in the lyrics above. Javert is singing a melody we've heard before. It's the same melody Valjean sang during his own identity crisis in "What Have I Done?" The lyrics are also parallel. But here, when Javert gets to the word "on," he sings this amazing, unexpected high no…

On Tuesday I went for another lovely walk in another lovely snowstorm. Everyone seemed good-humored about having to balance on snowbanks. At one point, there was a man some distance ahead of me who was walking toward me and yelling that he wanted a bear. I wasn't sure what to make of this, but decided to cross to the other side of the street. Just in case he mistook me for a bear.

I also saw a man in a business suit carrying a 2 x 4. He wasn't yelling anything, just smiling pleasantly and swinging his 2 x 4 in a jolly manner.

Later, I sat in my front room writing, watching the snow get wetter and wetter. For a few minutes there, right before it turned to rain, the snowflakes were as big as cream puffs!

The longer I go not owning a car, the happier I am not to own a car. Those of you who've been around my blog for a while might remember how heart-rending it was way back when I lost my car. Preview: IT WAS HEART-RENDING WHEN I LOST MY CAR. But then I moved to a land where a per…

I'm reading a book that's gutting me and I can't put it down; I had to hide it under a pile of blankets today in order to get any work done; and I think you should read it, too. It's called Hush and it's by Eishes Chayil, which is a pseudonym that means woman of valor in Yiddish.

A teenaged woman in a Hasidic community in Brooklyn, preparing herself for marriage, remembers an act of abuse within the community that she witnessed years ago. Today, she considers telling the truth about what she saw -- but knows that the consequences of doing so will be catastrophic, because her community insists on silence and has many, many mechanisms built into its social structure to enforce that silence. This is a book about a crime against a child, a tragedy, and a spectacularly unjust cover-up, and (like all the best books) it's about a lot of other things, too. It's beautifully written and completely believable (and also wickedly funny in places). I have no idea what'…

"So, I started hanging out with Rayanne Graff. Just for fun. Just because it seemed like if I didn't I would -- DIE, or something." I love the way the TV show My So-Called Life begins. It's a lesson in writing, actually: Angela is already breaking away from her best friend, Sharon; she's already started hanging out with Rayanne. The show plops us directly into the middle of Angela's new friends, new confusion and new experimentation, Rayanne's dangerous messy life, and Sharon's pain -- rather than showing us the drawn-out saga of Angela and Sharon happy together, then Rayanne luring Angela, then Angela and Sharon splitting up. Writing lesson: jump right into it. Start with the action, start with the meat of the matter, and let any necessary explanations trickle out as you move forward. (For the record, these are not my original thoughts. Thanks to Becca and Jess for the conversation we had about this -- I can't remember which of you point…

The Internets surely are dangerous today for people (i.e., me) trying to avoid the temptation of Mockingjay spoilers.

That's why I'm going to blog about twin babies!

So, here's the thing about twin babies: the ways they interact with each other are awesome. For example, the way the awake one tries to wake up the sleeping one: by patting her stomach, rolling around on top of her, and yelling, "ERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!" Or, the way the cheerful one tries to cheer up the fussy one: by patting her stomach, rolling around on top of her, and giggling, until both babies are giggling and rolling together.

This is IMMENSELY awesome.

And how about when they work together as a team?

The other day, I was in the kitchen, throwing some yummy baby foods into the crockpot. The babies were in the (baby-proofed) office, with the double stroller, wheels locked, in the office doorway, blocking them inside, akin to a baby gate. The babies were being pretty quiet, hanging out together, o…

So, I've still got those posts I want to write about writing, and I have a little time tonight... but I just don't have the brainpower or the heart. Or, rather, I do have the heart, but it's otherwise occupied. Brain, though: definitely absent.

In the meantime, in the world of the Internets, books, and television...

Internets!
Why on EARTH would Katsa and Hermione be fighting to the death? I keep trying to weigh their strengths and weaknesses and decide who would win, and I just end up giggling, because this is a fight that would not happen, except in the most bizarre circumstances. I'm thinking it would either need to involve a tragic misunderstanding that would lead to horrible guilt for the winner... or a weird circumstance in which the only way for one to save the world was to kill the other (i.e. -- BUFFY SPOILER! -- Buffy sending Angel into a hell dimension by plunging a sword into his heart)... which would lead to horrible guilt for the winner. Anyway, if you go o…

December 14, 2007

To: Headmaster Richmond and the Board of Directors, Alabaster Preparatory Academy

I, Frankie Landau-Banks, hereby confess that I was the sole mastermind behind the mal-doings of the Loyal Order of the Basset Hounds.
So opens one of my favorite books of all time, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, by E. Lockhart.

Recently I mentioned Marie Rutkoski's super fun post about good book boyfriends, bad book boyfriends, and what you can tell about a potential book boyfriend from his name. Marie and I got into a conversation over there about our favorite male character names and what they mean -- which, of course, devolved eventually to Spike, Angel, Jayne, and Mal, but anyway -- then, this past week, I reread The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks. I can't BELIEVE that I forgot about Alpha and Matthew when I was e-chatting with Marie! Talk about two larger-than-life boyfriends with names that matter.

This is the place in the post where I pause …

My post last Thursday spurred some fun reactions from friends and family, so I thought I'd follow up.


1. Did you startThe Name of the Rose(by Umberto Eco) next, like you thought you would?
No. I started Diana Comet and other Improbable Stories, by Sandra McDonald. I like it! It's a collection of interconnected fantastical short stories. Quirky and unpredictable, occasionally grim (war and battle, a warehouse fire, etc. well-written and vivid), with just enough similarities to the world we live in to keep me delighted, and sometimes even giggling. (E.g., a heartbroken cowboy in a Western town called Flagpole is reading the poetry of one Whitney Waltman.) Plus, it routinely plays with gender and sexuality in unexpected ways. My favorite story so far is one of the grim ones and is called The Firemen's Fairy, which is a double entendre.


2. [WARNING: The next question/answer contains The Hunger Games and Catching Fire spoilers. Sort of.]
Are you on Team Peeta or Team Gale?
I…

I wonder if anyone has ever written a paper about the wanton destruction of property and how it relates to the concepts of home and homelessness in the Buffyverse? Everytime I watch a "home" that I've grown fond of get torn up or chopped down or blown apart (for example -- spoilers! -- Buffy's living room; the library of Sunnydale High; Sunnydale itself; Angel's first L.A. office; various parts of Angel's hotel; Lorne's club over and over again), I think about it. It'd make an interesting paper. I'm not sure if there's such a thing as "home" in the Buffyverse.

And a more serious matter: I wonder if anyone has ever written a paper about how completely outlandish it is that Lindsey McDonald was voted number eight on the list of the Top 20 Sexiest Men in the Buffyverse. Eight? Seriously? I won't argue with Spike at #1 (even though I think of him as "generally fabulous" more than I think of him as sexy), and I can'…

I was thinking the other day that it'd be nice to live on the planet where the kingdoms of Attolia, Sounis, and Eddis are. After all, that planet has Gen, Irene, Helen, Sophos, Costis, the magus, and some chill-inducing gods, which makes it a damn awesome planet.

At the end of my deliberations, though, I decided I like our own planet best, and here's why: we have Megan Whalen Turner.

Take that, Sounis! *thbbbbttt*

You are not going to be disappointed by this book.

(For the uninitiated: read The Thief first. And for those in need of gifts for a book lover: A Conspiracy of Kings doesn't come out until April 2010, but The Thief, The Queen of Attolia, and The King of Attolia are all out in paperback.)

(Also -- I don't know if any of my readers will have read A Conspiracy of Kings already, but just in case any have, here's a warning for others to tread carefully through the comments to this post, because there may be Attolia spoilers. Commenters, please be kind and use …

Here's a moment from the first time Buffy's mother, Joyce, officially meets Buffy's vampire nemesis, Spike:

Joyce [pleasantly]: Have we met?
Spike: Um, you hit me with an axe one time.
[Joyce looks confused]
Spike: Remember? [helpfully brandishes imaginary axe] "Get the hell away from my daughter! Rawr!!!"

So, now and then I like to ask my readers to take a minute to introduce themselves. I expect I have a lot of regular readers who don't comment; I'm sure I have readers who're just passing through for the day; doubtless I have readers who got here by accident, having misspelled "Kristin Chenowith," and wish they'd never ended up here at all. :o)

Anyway, no pressure. But today I extend an invitation to all of you -- even the lurkers and the shy -- to tell me a little bit about yourself in a comment. You don't have to tell me your real name. But maybe you'd like to tell me where you are? What you do? What you feel like eating tod…

If you happened to see me at Books of Wonder on Tuesday covering my ears, singing "la la la la la la!", and seriously invading Scott Westerfeld's space, I swear, it was only because I was trying to avoid hearing the Liar spoilers happening on my other side! Justine Larbalestier was being an absolute champ trying to protect me from her conversations with her readers, but really, there's only so much an author can do! :o) Anyway, I got through unspoilered, and clearly, I need to read Liar ASAP. Oh, and the event was super. Thanks to everyone who came!

If you're a book blogger who wants to sign up for the Book Blogger Holiday Swap -- basically a Secret Santa among book bloggers world-wide -- today is the last day.

I'm having a busy week of train-riding and events -- I'm home again now, but tomorrow I'm off to New Jersey. Cross your fingers for me tomorrow evening, when I'll be giving a speech at the fall conference of the New Jersey Association o…

First, a couple links: a recent beautiful Astronomy Picture of the Day; and, if you happen to be a Battlestar Galactica fan, a recent segment from NPR's Weekend Edition all about the music of BSG. (Ahem. But please don't leave any Season 4 spoilers in the comments, because I'm only partway through the season. ^_^)

Second, I give notice: my blogging is apt to be spotty over the next few weeks as my move takes place. Monday the guy with the big truck comes to pick up the stuff. What happens next -- and when -- depends entirely on the schedule of the guy in the truck. We're rolling with it, people. Uncertainty is FUN! Sigh...

Third, a recent interesting FAQ:

You've mentioned that an adult edition of Graceling is available in the U.K., Australia, and the Netherlands, and is scheduled to be published in France. Is there an adult version of Graceling available in North America?

The "adult" British edition of Graceling and the "young adult" American…

What I'm Reading(Books)
Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. (Scholastic, September.) No spoilers here; I'm not going to say a damn thing about what happens in the book. Instead, I'll merely say that books like this are the reason I fell in love with reading. I stayed up until 5:30am reading it; it was thrilling; it was heartrending; it was wickedly funny; it was important. I care about these characters with all my heart. And, Ms. Collins? I bet you're already getting pressure from readers for the third book. From me, you get no pressure. From me, you get this instead: Take a break to celebrate what you've accomplished. And take as much time as the next book needs. I know it'll be worth waiting for.

What I'm Reading (Blogs)
I mentioned recently that there are only a few blogs I follow. Well, Laura's recent post at Pinot and Prose sums up why her blog is one of them. Laura is a librarian and amateur chef in Queens who blogs about children's literat…

A happy addition to my BEA schedule: On Saturday, May 30, from 1-3pm, I'll be signing books with Melissa Marr at Books of Wonder, 18 West 18th Street, New York City.

For today's post I direct you to the podcast of my recent conversation with Deirdre and Maria at the Mount Kisco Library in Mount Kisco, New York. Deirdre and Maria had some great questions about Graceling and YA lit! Here are some of the things we talked about:
Katsa's relationship with Raffinthe nature of Gracesfantasy character nameswhy YA is such a great genreMegan Whalen Turner and why "write faster!", though often meant as a compliment, might not be the most empathetic thing you can say to a writerthe anti-marriage thing (which, incidentally, I blogged about once, here)how my characters surprise me as I'm writing Warning: there are a few Graceling spoilers in the podcast.

Go here to listen. Thanks to Deirdre and Maria!

Dutch adult market cover of Graceling ---> click to enlarge --->
Last week I visited the Boston area for a few days. There, I: spent some time with a friend and a small orange furry quadruped person;got to hang out with my sister, secret code name: Apocalyptica, for an evening;made beef stroganoff;baked cookies;wrote 10 pages of a frustrating scene and crossed out 9; andaccomplished a very important secret mission.Then I flew back home to Florida, where the air feels like bathwater. There, I: went for a sunset walk along the river. The sky was dusty blue, the water was the color of an eggplant, and a humongous, nearly full, pale pink moon rose right out of nowhere. I live in such a beautiful place!;curled up on the couch and watched an embarrassing number of Veronica Mars episodes in succession. (My thoughts on Season 2 [SPOILERS!]: It's not as good as Season 1. However, I remain v. fond of Logan and am convinced that if everyone he loved would stop beating him up, betra…