OK, now it’s February. Here are some things that have happened since October 23:
– The Magicians won an Alex Award. Update: it looks like this:
Yes, it looks like a giant penny. But not in a bad way.
– I proposed an idea for a sequel to The Magicians to my publisher, Viking, and they bought it. It will be called The Magician King. I’m really excited about it. I’ve never had a publisher buy a book from me before the actual writing of said book — so for example I spent 5 years writing The Magicians without any particular reassurance from the universe that anybody but me would ever read it. For a publisher to commit to buying the book in advance is a big deal. It takes a lot of pressure off.
Of course Viking has also given me a deadline, which is interesting. I’ve never had one of those before either. They said August. I said October. They said OK. But there was a thought balloon over their head(s) that read “actually we really still mean August.” ETA in bookstores: late summer 2011.
– The paperback of The Magicians is coming out in May. With it comes another book tour. I don’t know all the details yet, but it’ll start at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books, and will include stops in San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, Phoenix, Minnesota, New York City, Miami, Austin and Washington DC. I’m really hoping to make each of the events kind of special — when I toured last fall I was still pretty freaked out to be in front of an audience, so hopefully I will not look as traumatized on stage as I did on the last outing. I’ve written a new piece just for readings, set in the Magicians-verse but not available in stores! as the TV ads used to say.
Also I’m planning on doing more post-reading drinking this time. So there’s that. The schedule is pretty close to being firm, and I’ll post it in Events as soon as I can.
– More good news associated with the paperback: I’ll be fixing typos and continuity errors! So far all those who’ve pointed out that they couldn’t have driven from the house upstate to Albany and back in the time allotted, if the house is — as I clearly imply — west of the Adirondacks, know this: I’ve got it totally under control.
– Sometimes people point out to me that although The Magicians gets some good reviews, it also gets its share of hate as well, and what’s up with that? I’ve looked into this, and I think I’ve figured it out. See, sometimes demons ascend from a lower realm to this one, possess a human and devour him or her from within, like some hideous larval parasite, leaving behind a hollow, ambulatory man-rind in that person’s place, a humanoid mockery of all that is good and true. Those demons then head straight for a keyboard and review The Magicians online. And some of those demons have really crap taste in books. So I hope that clears that up.
