Huh.
On Amazon, the new trade paperback of The Curse of Chalion does not show up under my name, or under the book's name, but when I searched by the ISBN, I found this entry:
Which does have a peek at the new cover design.
The entry may still be under construction, but really, it seems late for a book that's just about to come out...
Ta, L.
Subject: (news) Curse of Chalion in trade pb edition, April
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2006
Hi ho --
I just received via UPS the brand-new trade paperback edition of The Curse of Chalion, upcoming from Eos in April, right around the corner. They've re-designed the cover, although still incorporating some elements and the blue-and-gold color scheme from the mass market paperback. I think it looks very nice, properly classy. The interior design is much like the original hardcover, but it's easier on the wrists than the hardcover and easier on the eyes than the paperback.
It has two different ISBNs on the back:
ISBN-13: 978-0-06-113424-1
ISBN-10: 0-06-113424-4
Perhaps one of the booksellers on the list could enlighten us as to the difference. Besides three digits, that is.
Anyway, the hope is this may reach a different slice of the audience, perhaps bring in some new readers. I'll send a cover scan to Mike for the website shortly.
Ta, L.
Subject: (chat) The next thing after TSK
Date: Tue, 21 Mar 2006
Lois McMaster Bujold send the following to the mailing list:
Names, argh. (Need two more this morning, sigh. The characters can't go on being "x", even in first draft.)To which Dan Tilque responded:
Which, of course, means you're writing something new. Can you give us a hint about it? Fantasy or SF? Previously constructed universe or a new one? Does it have a publisher or will it be up for bid? Anything at all?And then Lois clarified:Dan Tilque
PS Need a proofreader?
A few hints, anyway. It does have a title: The Wide Green World. It's the direct sequel to The Sharing Knife. It's early days, material very much still under development, much impeded by the interminable screwed-up bathroom project, still not complete (the full tale of which I've mostly spun out over on Baen's Bar.) I've probably lost half my writing time since early January, which does not make me happy to dwell upon, so I try not to. WGW does not have a contract or a deadline -- I'm intensely grateful for the lack of deadline, just now -- or even, at this point, a projected length or any certainty of how many volumes it will be; it might be one fat book, or it might undergo mitosis again into another duology. It will not be a trilogy.
It will not exactly be up for bid, as there's only one place it can go, a fact that gives my agent some disappointment; she really likes exciting book auctions. In theory, it could be offered at any time, but for my own peace of mind I'd prefer to be farther along first.
But it's giving me pleasure to write -- in the peculiar irregular way that writing is a pleasure -- which is its main purpose in life at the moment. I'll be able to talk a little more about with without spoilers for TSK after TSK is out. To say much more about the content at this point would be very spoilerific indeed.
I have enough proofreaders for now, although two out of three are out of town at the moment and the other has a sick cat.
So, how about that Hallowed Hunt...?
Ta, L.
Subject: (chat) Ijada
Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2006
Hiya --
Just to settle a bet, here...
Ijada is pronounced: i as in "bit", ja as in "Jacques", da as in "dah" or the Russian word for yes. Emphasis on the second syllable.
The j in Brajar is pronounced the same way.
Ijada is Spanish for jade, or close to it. In the first draft, I started out calling the poor woman "Jadais", a name I dimly thought I was making up till I finally remembered where I'd seen it before. Or rather, I didn't, but Pat did, and saved me.
Ta, L.
Subject: (chat) HH: dedicat, acolyte, divine
Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2006
Some confusion has arisen re: religious ranks in the Chalionverse...
There are three: dedicat, acolyte, and divine.
Dedicat (no "e" on the end, note) is a rank roughly equivalent to "lay brother/sister". It commonly indicates one has taken up certain religious duties in addition to one's secular life. A dedicat is not necessarily of low rank. Hence the "Lord Dedicats" of certain high temple councils; they serve the temple or the gods in various ways, as commanders or administrators, but are not, strictly speaking, "in" the temple. (Some other, ordinary dedicat might be doing the laundry.) Dedicat is also the intitial rank of anyone who aspires to joining the temple proper, holy apprentices as it were, like those young nuns who are trying it out and who haven't taken their final vows yet. The name for which escapes me, because it's that kind of morning.
Acolyte is the next rank up from dedicat. This would be a person who is directly employed by and serves the temple, either in current capacity, or on the way to being a divine. Senior theology students, or persons of middle responsibilities who aren't going on to further training..
Divine is the (almost) highest rank; a divine would normally be a graduate of a seminary of theology or medicine, the equivalent of a trained priest. He or she is addressed by the term, "Learned" the way a priest is addressed as "Father".
Please note that I went to a lot of trouble to devise gender-neutral terms for all these!
A divine who teaches other divines, like Hallana or especially Oswin, gets an additional status and rank boost: Oswin, we note, is addressed as "Most Learned". The equivalent of "Doctor of Divinity". Hallana, note, is not a dedicat, she's a divine -- twice! Like someone with two masters degrees, in two different subjects.
Saints are entirely outside the temple heirarchy, because, after all, these people are for the most part not idiots. If you are being polite to a known saint, you might address him or her as "Bessed One". Hence the jolt in a little exchange later on in HH when Ingrey uses the term, revealing a perception he wasn't supposed to have.
Since this is the sort of "everybody knows this from the cradle" common knowledge in this world, and I've been in tight third viewpoints all along, I never stopped to explain it, just showed it in operation, hoping that most readers would grasp enough to go on with. Not sure if they all have.
Ta, L.
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