RANDOM WEDNESDAY

Lots of stuff to share with you today, and no real way to connect it all together. So let's celebrate a Random Wednesday!

First, there's some more buzz about Shadows on the Moon from Lynsey at Narratively Speaking here, from Liz of My Favourite Books on The Book Smugglers here and even from a Canadian blog called Tapestry of Words here. 

I'm really excited by all this advance interest because the lead-up to the release days of TSK and DotF was quite a lonely time for me. Even if your publisher is fantastic (and mine truly is), unless you're a Big Fat Deal like Stephenie Meyer or J.K. Rowling no one will give you much of an idea what they're doing to promote your book, or even much of an idea what YOU can do to promote it. I went out and did as much as I could myself by putting together a website, and arranging book signings and school visits, but I had no way of knowing how much difference that made or even if it had been a complete waste of time.

Now that I'm aware of the amazing British blogging community (and have even hopefully made a few friends within it) I feel much less scared and isolated. I know where to look to see how people feel about my work. The fact that I have blog readers who respond to my covers and my blurbs and let me know how they feel also really helps. Thanks everyone.

Another thank you is due to the blog readers who responded to my question on Monday about whether my best friend character in the Big Secret Project should be a gay guy or a gay girl. The overwhelming majority voted for a girl, mostly due to the lack of gay female characters in strong roles in YA fiction right now. I mean, they ARE there, and they're awesome, but you really have to search for them. Commentors said that they'd seen quite a few 'sassy gay friends' of the male persuasion and would find a female one more interesting for a change. So - there you go. Your wish is granted.

As you know, I'm still working on Big Secret Project and all details are subject to change. But I have just finished writing the synopses for it (YES, YES, YES!!!!) and I can tell you that the character you have helped to create is a sixteen year old Goth called Jack Lucy (Lucy is her surname and Jack is short for Jacqueline). She's naturally mousey but likes to die her hair a variety of bright colours, and she's extremely handy with an iron skillet (and I DON'T mean that she makes a good omelette). Hurrah!

My final random topic today is the release of the cover art for the new Mortal Instruments book by Cassandra Clare. As you may or may not know, there's been a lot of secrecy and hype over this cover, since the first Mortal Instruments Trilogy was a MegaBigBestseller and the new trilogy will carry on with the story of the same characters. I've personally been anticipating it because I adored the first trilogy and City of Fallen Angels is coming out in April of 2011 - making it the perfect birthday present for moi!

So, the cover has finally been revealed, and this is it:

You can see what Ms Clare has to say about it here.

What do you guys think of it?

PLOTTING A TRILOGY

You guys may have noticed that out of all the parts of a writer's process I could talk about, plotting is the one that comes up most often on this blog. Please don't run away with the idea that this is because I'm a plotting expert. I'm...seriously not. Plotting and pacing are the things I struggle with most and enjoy the least.

Characterisation? Comes pretty naturally, once I let my characters into my head. Style? I LOVE the English language, and I love playing with words and trying to create beautiful and startling images. But plot? God, just tie me into a hessian bag, wrap it in chains and throw it in a river. It'll be less painful and a heck of a lot less helpless feeling.

I've heard many other authors say that they love the planning stage of writing, when literally anything can happen, and they can play around with events, change anything they want, and not have to worry about it. I'm not sure what weird mojo goes on in those writer's heads, but it is entirely foreign to me, because frankly, when I first start trying to figure out what happens to who in a book and why and in what order, it feels as if I'm struggling around waist deep in a soup full of unexpected sharp/hard objects that keep hitting me and knocking me over. Blind folded.

That's why I'm always coming up with different ways to try and make plotting easier for myself (and you!). I've showed you my bullet-pointed lists and my diamond-diagrams before. Those serve me pretty well in a general way. But when I came to try and write the synopses for The Big Secret Project, which is a trilogy, I found that they just weren't helping me. I had so many more events to keep track of. I needed to be able to see not just the plot and character arcs for one book, but for three, and the over-arcing plot that would join all three stories together.

And so... I went out to my local stationary shop and grabbed some supplies. I decided I need a massive pad of paper so that I could see all my plots working against each other at the same time. Post-it notes also seemed like a good idea because that way I could try to imitate those 'I Love Planning' authors and move my events around easily. I needed a ruler to draw columns.

The coloured pens and star stickers were just for fun.

The first thing I did was to try and figure out what all the hard/sharp objects bumping into me in the soup were. I mean, maybe not all of them would be useful, but I wanted them out of the soup and on the page. So, I decided to brainstorm. I don't normally find brainstorming particularly helpful because it just makes me more confused (shut up, I can't HELP the way my brain IS, okay?) but in this case I assigned each book a colour and then randomly wrote down all the ideas I had for each one.

In some places I instantly realised that certain ideas fitted together better than others, and if they were marked the wrong colour, I put an asterisk in the right colour next to them. In other places I had cool ideas that didn't really seem anchored to the plot I had in mind and those got a star sticker. Looking at everyone all at once like that might seem like it would be overwhelming, but actually once it was on the paper it felt much more organised than it had in my head (not hard, really).

The second thing I did was to divide one page into three parts and start putting Post-its in lines so that I could see the stories for each book working parallel to one another. You will notice, by the way, in these pictures, that I have deliberately blurred out a lot of the words and the titles. This is because I know that certain readers, naming no names (*cough*Saya*cough*) would have no hesitation in zooming in and trying to make out details of The Big Secret Project. And since it's Secret, and all subject to change anyway, I just can't have that. Sorry! But I hope you can still see what I was aiming for.

Then I decided to break down the most important part of the story, which is the heroine's emotional arc, and how she changes throughout both books, what issues she has to start with, and when and how these are resolved.

With all this firmly pinned down I broke out the Microsoft OneNote programme, which I find particularly useful because it lets you scribble randomly all over the place, but keeps everything neat for you. I came up with this:

Which (one of the nice features of OneNote) includes links to useful webpages where I can go back and check my facts.

Having done all this, I now have a pretty good idea of what is going to happen to who, when and how. So I'm going to ask a question of my lovely blog readers, and your answer might influence the way this story is written.

My heroine needs to have a best friend. I know who this person is inside, but what I haven't decided yet is their outter trappings - ie, their gender and sexuality. It's always been really important for me to try and include characters of different cultures, races and faiths in my work, but recently I've also been attempting to include characters who do not fit into the Western World's narrow definition of heteronormative behavior. So help me out. What would make you happy? Do you think my heroine's best friend should be a gay GUY, or a gay GIRL? Either way they are extremely fierce, smart and protective, are a little bit Goth, and end up having an extremely complex love life throughout these books.

Tell me what you think in the comments!

FIVE THINGS ON A FRIDAY

Hi, everyone! How has your week been?

Mine's been up and down, to be honest. So I thought I would make that the topic of my Friday Five.

1. On Tuesday I woke up at 5:30 to find myself smushed into the wall by the unprecedented presence of a dog and two cats huddled on my bed. This was soon explained when I realised that my teeth were chattering and there was ice on the INSIDE of my windows. No joke. The boiler had stopped working in the night and therefore I had lost both central heating and hot water. I'm lucky not to have died in my bed. It's more or less fixed now, though (apart from me having to go into the false roof and empty out a bucket every now and again) so don't worry. I promise to finish revising FrostFire before I choke for any reason.
2. How to Train Your Dragon! Picked up the DVD on impulse while grocery shopping on Saturday. I'm so glad I did! It's the best film I've seen in ages. It's beautifully written and designed, has a wonderful score, and treats you to a thrill-packed action adventure with fully rounded characters and pitch-perfect emotional stakes. I want a Toothless of my own so much, Father Christmas. I promise, I'll be a good girl forever...
3. Working on three linked synopses for The Big Secret Project has been something of a challenge. I mean, I realised it would be different than working on a standalone book, but no one warned me HOW different. Normally when I start seriously trying to put together a story my head is full of millions of sprouting ideas and I just start trimming them off until I have something that looks both manageable and interesting. But in this case I need ALL the ideas. I need three booksworth of ideas. I can't afford to go cutting off the inconvenient dangly bits. Somehow I have to make sense of all of them and get them into the required order and shape. Hard. It is very. More on this next week, possibly with diagrams.
4. Today, I had one of those unexpected days where you have a long To Do List and you square your shoulders...and somehow it all works out and you get everything done and you end up with a wonderful glow of satisfaction. Chrismassy satisfaction. I dug all the snow and ice off my front and back paths. I decorated my Christmas tree. I drank mulled wine. I took my dog for two long snowy walks AND I had a blinding inspiration about Big Secret Project, which fills me with relief and happiness. It's a Christmas Miracle! Hurrah!
5. Today's crowning glory - I got an email from Veronica Roth telling me that I was one of the winners of her giveaway for ARCs of Divergent, her upcoming debut Dystopian novel. I'm ecstatic, because I was already really excited to read this, and now I don't have to wait until next year!

That's my name on there! Yay!

So on Tuesday I was convinced that this was going to be the worse week ever, and instead it's turned out pretty well. There's a lesson to be learned from this. Hang on long enough, and almost everything will get better eventually.

Now, before I go, I had a reader email recently from Faith, asking:

"I like to write as well,but I have a problem I will think of something, usaully it turns into the main part but then I cant figure out how to start it or finish it.So I just give up can you help me."

I don't think this is necessarily a big problem. Not all writers work from start to finish in order, and it sounds to me like you're a non-linear writer, Faith. Stephenie Meyer famously began writing Twilight right in the middle of the story following a vivid dream, and it didn't do her any harm.

My advice to you is to go with it and have fun. If you have an idea for what seems like the middle of the story, then write it. Enjoy yourself. If you let yourself get drawn into the story and characters, you'll hopefully find that your brain starts to fill up with other ideas for where to take them. Either, like Stephenie Meyer, you'll carry on writing until you eventually get to the end, or else other random scenes from later or earlier in the story will begin to appear in your head one by one, and you can keep writing them until you figure out how to link them all together.

I hope that's helpful, Faith! Have a lovely weekend everyone, and check out How to Train Your Dragon, if you haven't already.

SHADOWS ON THE MOON BUZZ

As I believe I mentioned briefly on this blog before, on Saturday the 27th of November I got up at an unGodly hour (5:55 am), put on my make-up, straightened my hair and then made my way to my local railway station. There I began a somewhat arduous three-hour journey to London. Luckily the snow was not yet as bad as it's been for the past week, but it was still bad enough that I was stuck in Doncaster for an extra hour, and turned up late at my final destination (sorry, everyone!) which was Walker Books Ltd, my UK publisher's office.

But I didn't care! Let me tell you why.

The reason I'd been asked to visit the Walker offices that day is that my publisher has a really exciting line up of new YA books planned for next year. These books will be released as part of their new Undercover Reading range. And Shadows on the Moon is one of those books. The fabulous PR and marketing departments at Walker had decided to hold an event to promote the Undercover range and invite some influential bloggers to hear all about it.

And I, dear readers, was the Mystery Author.

Although I've done quite a few Inspiring Speeches about my books at this point, for instance at the Walker Sales Conference in September, I have to admit that I was reeeally nervous about this event. Shadows on the Moon is so special to me, and I desperately wanted to convey that specialness to these fabulous bloggers (all of whose blogs I already followed). These are people who've been to a LOT of publishing events. These are people who've met and chatted with really famous authors like Maggie Stiefvater. Cue: Zolah Freakout.

I turned up, late, hot and bothered, with hat-hair, and plunged into this roomful of important people to babble at them and give them presents. I told them all about the book, and then answered many astute questions with more babbling (are you sensing a theme there?) To my surprise, I found I really enjoyed it. Of course the bloggers were all passionate about books and reading anyway, so that helped, as did the support of the lovely Annalie (my long-suffering and supremely patient editor) and other Walker peeps Ruth, Rebecca and Sean. And then I went home. And the next day I woke up and thought: "Oh God, WHY did I have to talk so much? Why did I have to talk so fast? I bet no one understood a word I SAID! Arhgkkllghh!"

But it's okay! I need not have despaired, because apparently said bloggers are used to listening to hysterical authors babble. Either that or Annalie was discreetly translating for me. Anyway, the event reports are starting to show up on the interwebz now, and they are overwhelmingly positive about My Preeessshcious. So I thought I'd share.

Lauren at I was a Teenage Book Geek talks about it here.
Liz from My Favourite Books talks about it here.
Sarah from Sarah's Book Reviews talks about it here.

Becky from The Bookette and Lynsey from Narratively Speaking haven't posted their event reports yet, but I'm crossing my fingers that they will soon.

Thanks for making my slightly nerve-wracking day out fun, Kindly Bloggers. Hopefully I'll get to meet you all again one day!

FROSTFIRE IS FIIIIIINIIIIISHED!!!!

Wheeee! Best. Monday. EVAH.

Just over 85,000 words of wolfy, romantic, action-adventurey goodness is now complete. I'm going to put this to one side until the first week of January, when I'll just comb through it one more time for typos and embarrassing boo-boos, before I send it to my editor on the 10th of January. That is, the very DAY she returns from her extremely well deserved holiday. No rest for the virtuous!

Besides, if I try to hang onto it any longer I'm bound to start fiddling, and given that I've done nothing but work on this book since April, I'll be in serious danger of making that weird mud-colour that you get when you put red and blue and green and yellow and pink and white together and just keep stirring.

I will, of course, give you guys lots more details about this book when I'm sure that my lovely editor isn't going to make me completely re-write the whole thing. For now, suffice it to say that it's a companion book to DotF, but doesn't feature any of the same characters, and that it also has my very first love triangle - but, for anyone heaving a bored sigh, this is NOT like any love triangle you've ever come across in YA before. BELIEVE ME. *Snorks with private laughter*

All being well, FrostFire is scheduled to be released (along with a re-jacketed DotF) in July 2012. Exciting stuff.

So, what is Zolah going to be working on next? Well, I've been noodling around with the idea for what I've been calling a Gothic Clockpunk Romance for a while now, and I think this is what my publisher would like me to do. For those of you who've been paying attention, you may remember this as the Giant Killer Clockwork Praying Mantis Death Robot book. Catchy, eh? I'll probably start on that in earnest in the new year.

Before then, to stop myself getting all tense and ansty and cross, I'll be writing a synopsis (or rather, three synopses) for The Big Secret Project. Which is, you know, Big. And Secret. But since it's you, I'll slip you some hints. *Looks around furtively*

Hopefully Big Secret Project will be a story that takes place over not one, not two, but three whole books. As a devoted lover of fantasy trilogies and series, it's really exciting to realise that I've got a story which has enough guts to work that way. At the same time, it's pretty terrifying for someone who's always written standalones to try and plot something that doesn't come to a neat end in a single book. Big Secret Project will also allow me to utilize all that research I did on Japan for Shadows. And that's all I'm saying. My lips, they are sealed.

And now, I am going to go and collapse from SHEER RELIEF! See you on Wednesday!

VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE WRITING CAVE

Hello readers, old and new. At least, I hope there are some new ones, since the follower numbers have leapt up (woohoo! Well done everyone!). I also hope you old faithfuls are all here too. And that none of you are suffering from frostbite in the current inclement weather. I swear, if I hear anyone whistling 'White Christmas' in the next month I'll smack them one.

Today I thought I'd give you a virtual tour of The Writing Cave. Anyone who's watched my YouTube videos will have caught the odd glimpse of the place where I work, but I've never shown it in much detail, because I was hoping that one day I might get to be one of those posh writers who get interviewed in their study by a newspaper and have pictures taken under a title like WRITER'S HIDEAWAY REVEALED. This happened to Kevin Crossley-Holland. This is his study:

Droolworthy, right?

But the other day it occurred to me that there's actually not room in my Writing Cave for a journalist and a photographer. There's barely room for me. If I turn my chair around too quickly the arms whack into the desk, or sweep books and papers onto the floor. And anyway, if I ever become important enough that a newspaper wants to interview me, I'll probably have already moved into my sustainably sourced timber-framed eco house, so I'll have a completely different writer's cave. And thus I present to you:

This is where the magic happens. And now the writer's-eye-view:

To the left of my secretaire there's a rocking chair where Beulah now lives, only it's not really a rocking chair because it doesn't have any room to rock in that corner. It's very comfy though. I got it for £60 from a house clearance.

Here's one of my incredibly untidy bookcases. The untidiness is not really my fault. I always kept my study well organised up until recently, when I had workmen in fiddling with my radiator. While I wasn't around they tipped all the books off this case and then shoved them back on two-deep, creating the chaos you see here. I swear I'm going to take a day off soon and put everything back in it's proper order.

And finally, here's the view out of my window, snow, icicles and all.

SHADOWS ON THE MOON GIVEAWAY: REVISED

Yes, we're back to this again. First of all, for those who didn't read the note attached to Monday's post there are now THREE ARCs of Shadows on the Moon on offer. This is probably the only ARC giveaway I'll be doing, because the few copies I've got left will be tied up in blog tours. So you need to enter now or forever hold your piece (until July 4th anyway).

Here's the book blurb from Goodreads:

"On my fourteenth birthday when the sakura was in full bloom, the men came to kill us. We saw them come, Aimi and me. We were excited, because we did not know how to be frightened. We had never seen soldiers before."

Suzume is a shadow-weaver. She can create mantles of darkness and light, walk unseen in the middle of the day, change her face. She can be anyone she wants to be. Except herself. Suzume died officially the day the Prince's men accused her father of treason. Now even she is no longer sure of her true identity.

Is she the girl of noble birth living under the tyranny of her mother’s new husband, Lord Terayama? A lowly drudge scraping a living in the ashes of Terayama’s kitchens? Or Yue, the most beautiful courtesan in the Moonlit Lands?

Everyone knows Yue is destined to capture the heart of a prince. Only she knows that she is determined to use his power to destroy Terayama.

And nothing will stop her. Not even love.

Excited? I know I am!

However, it's been brought to my attention that there are plenty of faithful blog readers who cannot get or do not want a Google account, and can't 'follow' using the friend connect device on the right. Which means, according to the rules I posted before, that they can't enter. How unfair! I'm sorry I didn't realise this until it was pointed out to me. I don't want any regular reader to be left out in my quest to get new followers.

The object of the competition was for me to send my lovely readers out to be my emissaries and get me *more* readers. I'd still like you all to do that, and the best way for me to keep track of this is through the friend connect system. But so long as we DO get 200 followers through Google Connect by Christmas, I'm happy to expand the draw to include people who can't actually follow through Google.

So for anyone who can't enter the giveaway through becoming a follower, you can do so by leaving a comment, including your email address (just to make life easier for me) in the comment trail below THIS post. If you also want to link the competition to Facebook or Tweet about it or put a link to the giveaway in your blog sidebar or even do a blog post of your own celebrating our little-known-yet-much-loved-blog, that's fantastic, but you don't have to provide links to prove it.  All that matters is the 200 in the sidebar.

I hope this makes everyone happy, or at least happier than they were. And now, if you will excuse me, I'm going to attempt to take my dog for a walk through the two foot high snow drifts surrounding my house, which I believe must be my punishment for daring to say, in the last post, that I'd decided I liked snow.

Le Sigh.