Flora's Dare

So about a month ago, I finally finished reviewing the galley's of FLORA'S DARE, the next segment of Flora Fyrdraaca's big adventure. Galleys are now gone to the place there galleys go to grow into real books, and so officially FLORA'S DARE is done. Finito. Finished. Over. Done.

And I have to say that I feel pretty good about it, over-all. Of course, there are always those moments where you think: I Suck, the Book Sucks, the World Sucks, whydidieverthinkthiswasagoodidea, and then you mope around in woe and trouble deaf heaven with your bootless cries, and etc. I had a few of those moments during the writing of FLORA'S DARE, but they were few, and their memory has now faded, and I am happy with the finished result. I think it is MUCHO MUCHO better than FLORA SEGUNDA, for one thing, which is a great relief. It's always a huge worry that your second book will not be as good as your first, but I'm not worried about that at all. Poor FLORA I really got put through the mill, was rewritten umpteen times, and suffered from being cobbled together--and in places, the scars show. FLORA II came out in a much more cohesive manner, and only had to be revised once, and had no cobbling.

I did end up rewriting the last 50 pages in 36 hours when I had one of those last minute brilliant ideas, but that worked out in the end too, and I'm pretty happy. I hope everyone who reads the final result will be pretty happy too. Book is scheduled for September 1st...

Oh and I can't remember if I ever officially announced the title change, so I shall do so now. For ages, I had been called the book FLORA REDUX, but the Publisher Powers that Be weren't so keen on that title, so I went back to the title board and finally came up with:

Flora's Dare: How a Girl of Spirit Gambles All to Expand Her Vocabulary, Confront a Bouncing Boy Terror, and Try to Save Califa from a Shaky Doom (Despite Being Confined to Her Room)

Nicely long and unwieldy, huh? I aim to please.

Flora's Honours!

In my long Period of Silence, I have been lax about chortling over two huge honours that FLORA SEGUNDA has recently received.

One, of course, is the nomination for the Andre Norton Award, given out annually by the voting membership of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. I'm in supremely good company here, for the other nominees include Sarah Beth Durst, Steve Berman, Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu, and Rex Adam. The award, which is specifically for young adult fantasy and science fiction, has only been around for two years, but it's the only award out there that targets the YA SF&F audience, so it's a great honour to be nominated.

Also a great honour was FLORA SEGUNDA making the James Tiptree Award Honours List. The Tiptree Award is given out specifically for books that explore or expand our concepts of gender. Since gender is one of my compelling interests, and exploration of gender is one of my driving forces--and an important aspect of my writing. I think about gender construction constantly when I write, and constantly as I world build, and it pleases me greatly that the Tiptree Jury recognized this!

FLORA SHRUNK!

Finally, FLORA SEGUNDA has been shrunk and rewrapped and is now available in paperback. For reasons that I can't quite determine, it doesn't come up on Amazon if you search under either my name or the book's title, but it's in the great Amazon database somewhere, and so hopefully those who need to find it will find it.

The cover looks much cooler in real life; tho' I liked the hardback cover well enough, I have to admit to some pleasure that Crackpot Hall, rather than Madama Flora, is now the focus, and ever-so gothic-y, too!

I got some super happy blurbs, from super fab people, including Diana Wynne Jones, Kelly Link, Charles de Lint and The New York Times.

Woo!