Welcome to Biting-Edge, a blog shared by authors and vampire experts, Mario Acevedo and Jeanne Stein. We’ll cover urban fantasy, vampires, pop culture, and all things Joss Whedon. Unlike other fantasy blogs, we don’t insist on body cavity searches (unless you ask politely). Snarkiness is most welcome...though we won't promise not to bite back!
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
One of those weeks...
This has been one of those weeks that I both love and hate. Love because I accomplished a huge housekeeping task that I'd been putting off since January--converting a basement bedroom that had become the house "junk drawer" back to what I had intended it to be--my book room. My sister is coming to visit which was the motivation to finally getting it done. And I did. But in the process, something had to suffer.
That's where the hate comes in. I fell woefully behind in my writing. I'm supposed to be halfway to the NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000 words--I'm weighing in at about 9,000. Can I catch up? With the holiday and company? Probably not. Will I try? Damn straight!
Also, I had a friend come in to town over the weekend from San Diego. It snowed. I hate driving in snow. Even after seventeen or so years of living in Colorado, I still avoid doing it at all costs. So, Gary, I'm sorry our timing was so off. Sunday morning dawned bright and clear and I figured, great, we can meet downtown, do brunch, a little sightseeing. But for some reason, we failed to make contact. Messages didn't get through. Maybe we'll have better luck next time.
Tomorrow night (I'm writing this on Wednesday afternoon--instead of working on my novel, I might add) Mario and I and the rest of our Pearl Street Critique gang are attending the first signing of one of our RMFW pals--Linda Hull.
Publisher's Weekly had this to say about her debut novel, The Big Bang:
“Hull’s satisfying debut explores the McMansions of Melody Mountain Ranch, a planned suburb where eating disorders, lesbian affairs, and a coven of teenage witches are just a few of the outrageous secrets hiding behind the idyllic facades. Hull deftly handles a multitude of complicated characters and brings about a conclusion that will leave readers suitably scandalized.”
Sounds like fun!! Who doesn't like being suitably scandalized!! Since Linda is one of the Hand Hotel Writers, I can't wait to share this evening with her. There's nothing like an author's first signing. If you'd like to share in the festivities, too, Linda will be signing at the Tattered Cover (LoDo), 7:30 PM, 1628 16th Street, Denver, CO 80202.
Don't be shy. Come on up and say hello. Mario might bite, but I don't.
That's where the hate comes in. I fell woefully behind in my writing. I'm supposed to be halfway to the NaNoWriMo goal of 50,000 words--I'm weighing in at about 9,000. Can I catch up? With the holiday and company? Probably not. Will I try? Damn straight!
Also, I had a friend come in to town over the weekend from San Diego. It snowed. I hate driving in snow. Even after seventeen or so years of living in Colorado, I still avoid doing it at all costs. So, Gary, I'm sorry our timing was so off. Sunday morning dawned bright and clear and I figured, great, we can meet downtown, do brunch, a little sightseeing. But for some reason, we failed to make contact. Messages didn't get through. Maybe we'll have better luck next time.
Tomorrow night (I'm writing this on Wednesday afternoon--instead of working on my novel, I might add) Mario and I and the rest of our Pearl Street Critique gang are attending the first signing of one of our RMFW pals--Linda Hull.
Publisher's Weekly had this to say about her debut novel, The Big Bang:
“Hull’s satisfying debut explores the McMansions of Melody Mountain Ranch, a planned suburb where eating disorders, lesbian affairs, and a coven of teenage witches are just a few of the outrageous secrets hiding behind the idyllic facades. Hull deftly handles a multitude of complicated characters and brings about a conclusion that will leave readers suitably scandalized.”
Sounds like fun!! Who doesn't like being suitably scandalized!! Since Linda is one of the Hand Hotel Writers, I can't wait to share this evening with her. There's nothing like an author's first signing. If you'd like to share in the festivities, too, Linda will be signing at the Tattered Cover (LoDo), 7:30 PM, 1628 16th Street, Denver, CO 80202.
Don't be shy. Come on up and say hello. Mario might bite, but I don't.
Labels: Linda Joffe Hull, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, The Big Bang
¶ posted by Jeanne Stein @ 1:09 PM 0 comments
Sunday, June 05, 2011
The Iron Druid, Rage, and what's on the other side of the Swamp
Mario here:
In case you haven't tuned into the grapevine lately, urban fantasy scribe and fellow Leaguer Kevin Hearne will be coming to Denver this week. Wednesday, June 8, he'll be signing at the Broadway Book Mall at 7:30PM. Hexed and Hounded have been getting great reviews. Drop by and learn about the awesomeness that inspired these outstanding covers.
Another Leaguer, the razor-sharp and erudite Jackie Morse Kessler, gives her response to a Wall Street Journal article that used her YA novel Rage as an example of modern teen literature that exploits youth self-injury and other adolescent destructive behavior. As expected with these hatchet jobs, the article took pieces of Kessler's narrative out of context and didn't bother to interview her about why she thought to address the issue of self-injury in the book. Kessler speaks of self-destructive behavior from personal experience and uses her novels as a forum to bring light on these issues.
If you want to meet other Denver area writers, stop by the Creative Connections Expo, this Thursday, June 9, 2-7PM, at the Colorado Community Church, 3651 S Colorado Blvd, Englewood, CO 80113. The event is sponsored by the Creative Connections trade show and the Denver Writers Meetup’s Writer Services Fair. And it's FREE!
Next Saturday, June 11, I'll be one of the featured authors at the RMFW Education Event: The Final Edit with Charlotte Cook of KOMENAR Publishing. The workshop will be at the Two Rivers Convention Center, 159 Main Street, Grand Junction, CO, 8AM-4PM. The other authors, Robin D Owens and Christine Goff, and I will be critiquing sample pages of attending writers. To enroll, contact Vickie Law: vruchhoeft@bresnan.net.
Besides doing yeoman duty for the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, I've got a busy schedule with Lighthouse Writer's LitFest. This Tuesday, I'll be at Denver Civic Theater with the Salon: The Final Word--On Final Words, where a panel of most-excellent authors: Eleanor Brown: David Wroblewski; and William Haywood Henderson--plus me--will slice-and-dice writing that part of the novel way past the tricky beginning and the swamp in the middle...I mean, THE END. For more info, check out this posting on the League blog.
In case you haven't tuned into the grapevine lately, urban fantasy scribe and fellow Leaguer Kevin Hearne will be coming to Denver this week. Wednesday, June 8, he'll be signing at the Broadway Book Mall at 7:30PM. Hexed and Hounded have been getting great reviews. Drop by and learn about the awesomeness that inspired these outstanding covers.
Another Leaguer, the razor-sharp and erudite Jackie Morse Kessler, gives her response to a Wall Street Journal article that used her YA novel Rage as an example of modern teen literature that exploits youth self-injury and other adolescent destructive behavior. As expected with these hatchet jobs, the article took pieces of Kessler's narrative out of context and didn't bother to interview her about why she thought to address the issue of self-injury in the book. Kessler speaks of self-destructive behavior from personal experience and uses her novels as a forum to bring light on these issues.
If you want to meet other Denver area writers, stop by the Creative Connections Expo, this Thursday, June 9, 2-7PM, at the Colorado Community Church, 3651 S Colorado Blvd, Englewood, CO 80113. The event is sponsored by the Creative Connections trade show and the Denver Writers Meetup’s Writer Services Fair. And it's FREE!
Next Saturday, June 11, I'll be one of the featured authors at the RMFW Education Event: The Final Edit with Charlotte Cook of KOMENAR Publishing. The workshop will be at the Two Rivers Convention Center, 159 Main Street, Grand Junction, CO, 8AM-4PM. The other authors, Robin D Owens and Christine Goff, and I will be critiquing sample pages of attending writers. To enroll, contact Vickie Law: vruchhoeft@bresnan.net.
Besides doing yeoman duty for the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, I've got a busy schedule with Lighthouse Writer's LitFest. This Tuesday, I'll be at Denver Civic Theater with the Salon: The Final Word--On Final Words, where a panel of most-excellent authors: Eleanor Brown: David Wroblewski; and William Haywood Henderson--plus me--will slice-and-dice writing that part of the novel way past the tricky beginning and the swamp in the middle...I mean, THE END. For more info, check out this posting on the League blog.Labels: Iron Druid, Kevin Hearne, Lighthouse Writers, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers
¶ posted by Mario Acevedo @ 2:42 PM 5 comments
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Books, books and more books
Hi friends-- back from RT...sleep deprived but in one piece. Mario is disappointed.
Lots of book tidbits today. This one in particular caught my eye:
It's always amazing to me when a treasure shows up in someone's attic or basement. Why can't it happen to me? I have an attic and a basement.
Lots of book tidbits today. This one in particular caught my eye:
It's always amazing to me when a treasure shows up in someone's attic or basement. Why can't it happen to me? I have an attic and a basement.
# # # #
And speaking of "found" items:
FOUND: Gene Roddenberry's original 1964 pitch for Star Trek!
From: blastr
A pop culture blog called Between the Pages has a link up to an online copy of Roddenberry's initial outline for the series, dated March 11, 1964. The show itself premiered on Sept. 8, 1966, and in the intervening two years, a whole lot changed. For instance:
♦ Roddenberry's original captain was not James Kirk or Christopher Pike, but Robert April;
♦ The ship was first called the U.S.S. Yorktown;
♦ The navigator was not a young Russian hotshot named Pavel Chekov, but a young South American hotshot named Jose Ortegas;
♦ Spock was the "first lieutenant" and described as having a reddish complexion and, of course, pointed ears, and was probably "half Martian."
Roddenberry's 16-page outline also contains his now-famous description of the show as a sort of sci-fi Wagon Train, and does not mention anything like a transporter beam; the crew would land on planets via small recon vehicles. Early ideas for communicators, universal translators and phaser weapons can also be found within.
Most fascinating, however, are the story ideas that Roddenberry includes—many of which formed the basis for or at least planted the seed for classic episodes like "Charlie X," "Shore Leave," "A Piece of the Action," "The Return of the Archons," "The Savage Curtain," "Mirror, Mirror" and what eventually became the show's first pilot, "The Cage." Some of his dicier ideas—like a planet where slavery is the norm, except that whites are the slaves—never made it to the show at all (probably just as well).
So if you thought you knew everything about Star Trek, this document might hold some surprises for you. Either way, it's an essential read—after all, these 16 pages are where a legendary science fiction franchise began!
FOUND: Gene Roddenberry's original 1964 pitch for Star Trek!
From: blastr
A pop culture blog called Between the Pages has a link up to an online copy of Roddenberry's initial outline for the series, dated March 11, 1964. The show itself premiered on Sept. 8, 1966, and in the intervening two years, a whole lot changed. For instance:
♦ Roddenberry's original captain was not James Kirk or Christopher Pike, but Robert April;
♦ The ship was first called the U.S.S. Yorktown;
♦ The navigator was not a young Russian hotshot named Pavel Chekov, but a young South American hotshot named Jose Ortegas;
♦ Spock was the "first lieutenant" and described as having a reddish complexion and, of course, pointed ears, and was probably "half Martian."
Roddenberry's 16-page outline also contains his now-famous description of the show as a sort of sci-fi Wagon Train, and does not mention anything like a transporter beam; the crew would land on planets via small recon vehicles. Early ideas for communicators, universal translators and phaser weapons can also be found within.
Most fascinating, however, are the story ideas that Roddenberry includes—many of which formed the basis for or at least planted the seed for classic episodes like "Charlie X," "Shore Leave," "A Piece of the Action," "The Return of the Archons," "The Savage Curtain," "Mirror, Mirror" and what eventually became the show's first pilot, "The Cage." Some of his dicier ideas—like a planet where slavery is the norm, except that whites are the slaves—never made it to the show at all (probably just as well).
So if you thought you knew everything about Star Trek, this document might hold some surprises for you. Either way, it's an essential read—after all, these 16 pages are where a legendary science fiction franchise began!
# # # #
From Shelf Awareness and the New York Times :
The estate of James Jones has made an agreement with Open Road Integrated Media to issue 10 titles by the author in e-book form, including an edition of the classic From Here to Eternity that restores "explicit mentions of gay sex and a number of four-letter words" that were deleted by his publisher, Scribner, when the book was originally published in 1951, according to the New York Times. James had fought the censorship, arguing to his editor that "the things we change in this book for proprietary's sake will in five years, or ten years, come in someone else's book anyway."
It only took fifty years.
The estate of James Jones has made an agreement with Open Road Integrated Media to issue 10 titles by the author in e-book form, including an edition of the classic From Here to Eternity that restores "explicit mentions of gay sex and a number of four-letter words" that were deleted by his publisher, Scribner, when the book was originally published in 1951, according to the New York Times. James had fought the censorship, arguing to his editor that "the things we change in this book for proprietary's sake will in five years, or ten years, come in someone else's book anyway."
It only took fifty years.
# # # #
Okay, this goes out to my author friends who have children. How perfect is this? A book you can sleep in! From Flavorwire :
# # # #
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 2
Love this poster. It's sad and exciting all at the same time to think we've come to the end of the journey. Remember the Harry from The Sorcerer's Stone?
Wow!
And you'll see right away why I like this one so much:
Do you recognize the little character? It's Mario...yes, a Mario shelf!!!!
Readers young and old are invited to the Library's 12th Annual Colorado Author Open House on Sunday, April 17, 2011. 1 - 3 pm. Books will be available for purchase.
1000 Englewood Parkway
First Floor • Englewood Civic Center
Englewood, CO 80110
303-762-2560
A reminder about Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers May event including a chance to get a critique by me on two pages of your own writing.
Saturday, May 21 8:00a to 4:00p
at Renaissance Hotel, Denver, CO
Price: $70 early registration; $85 after April; $95 at the door
Phone: (970) 497-6452
Age Suitability: None Specified
Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers is sponsoring a one-day workshop featuring Kirt Hickman, author of Revising Fiction: Making Sense of the Madness. The workshop will be held at the Renaissance Hotel on May 21st. Colorado authors Carol Berg, Jeanne Stein and Betsy Dornbusch will be on-hand to answer writing-related questions or critique the first two pages of your manuscript. For more information please see Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers’ website at rmfw.org or contact Vicki Law at (970) 497-6452.
More details here
On the book front-got an email from pal Toni Kelner who said in the next issue of RT Book Review Magazine Hexed was reviewed. Not only got 4 1/2 stars but was a top pick!!! Anthologies don't often get that nod so I'm thrilled.
And a gentle reminder that Crossroads is available for preorder from Amazon your favorite Indie , and/or Barnes and Noble
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — Part 2
Love this poster. It's sad and exciting all at the same time to think we've come to the end of the journey. Remember the Harry from The Sorcerer's Stone?
Wow!
# # # #
One more bit of crazy before I get to some personal news. Here are 20 Insanely Creative Bookshelves from Buzzfeed
And you'll see right away why I like this one so much:
Do you recognize the little character? It's Mario...yes, a Mario shelf!!!!
# # # #
Now for some BSP--
First off, Sunday is the Englewood Library's Meet the Faces Behind the Books gig. Over 60 fiction, nonfiction, YA, Children's authors and illustrators will be in attendance. Including moi.
Here are the details:
Readers young and old are invited to the Library's 12th Annual Colorado Author Open House on Sunday, April 17, 2011. 1 - 3 pm. Books will be available for purchase.
1000 Englewood Parkway
First Floor • Englewood Civic Center
Englewood, CO 80110
303-762-2560
A reminder about Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers May event including a chance to get a critique by me on two pages of your own writing.
Saturday, May 21 8:00a to 4:00p
at Renaissance Hotel, Denver, CO
Price: $70 early registration; $85 after April; $95 at the door
Phone: (970) 497-6452
Age Suitability: None Specified
Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers is sponsoring a one-day workshop featuring Kirt Hickman, author of Revising Fiction: Making Sense of the Madness. The workshop will be held at the Renaissance Hotel on May 21st. Colorado authors Carol Berg, Jeanne Stein and Betsy Dornbusch will be on-hand to answer writing-related questions or critique the first two pages of your manuscript. For more information please see Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers’ website at rmfw.org or contact Vicki Law at (970) 497-6452.
More details here
On the book front-got an email from pal Toni Kelner who said in the next issue of RT Book Review Magazine Hexed was reviewed. Not only got 4 1/2 stars but was a top pick!!! Anthologies don't often get that nod so I'm thrilled.
And a gentle reminder that Crossroads is available for preorder from Amazon your favorite Indie , and/or Barnes and Noble
Labels: blastr, Buzzfeed, Crossroads, Flavorwire, HP and the Deathly Hallows, Meet the Faces Behind the Books, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, Toni L. P Kelner
¶ posted by Jeanne Stein @ 4:34 PM 6 comments
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Sweet action on Broadway and the WOTY changes heads.
Mario here,
Pam is the conference chair (twice in fact) for the annual Colorado Gold Conference. Her debut novel, Chances, won the Holt Medallion Award and was a Willa Finalist. Hoo-rah!
On other news, Charlie Huston's novel, The Mystic Arts for Erasing All Signs of Death, has been green lighted by HBO. Those of you with Hollywood experience know this means simply, stay tuned. Until then, do yourselves a favor and read Huston's hard-boiled prose in a weird, horrific, and funny tale about the people who do crime scene clean-up.
The people have spoken. Specifically, the members of Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers. I pass the Writer Of The Year crown to a most deserving winner--Pam Nowak. The announcement was made Saturday at the annual picnic where the temperature felt like we were on the planet Mercury. The nominees included (l-r) sci-fi author Laura Reeves, Pam Nowak, and the prolific Kay Bergstrom.
Pam is the conference chair (twice in fact) for the annual Colorado Gold Conference. Her debut novel, Chances, won the Holt Medallion Award and was a Willa Finalist. Hoo-rah!Later on, Jeanne and I were the guest presenters at the Denver Area Science Fiction Association monthly meeting at the Broadway Book Mall. Ron Else, Jeanne, Rose Beetem, and Nina Else (seated) with a comic from you-know-who.
Afterwords, we decided to cool off and hiked a few blocks to Sweet Action Ice Cream where Jeanne got a little too carried away showing her appreciation for the pleasures of a hot fudge sundae.
On other news, Charlie Huston's novel, The Mystic Arts for Erasing All Signs of Death, has been green lighted by HBO. Those of you with Hollywood experience know this means simply, stay tuned. Until then, do yourselves a favor and read Huston's hard-boiled prose in a weird, horrific, and funny tale about the people who do crime scene clean-up.This week both Jeanne and I will be in San Diego for ComicCon.
Here's my schedule of appearances.
Thursday, July 22, 4:30-5:30PM
Signing, IDW Publishers booth
Friday, July 23, 3-4PM
Bite Me: Evolving Urban Fantasy beyond the Vampire Phenomenon
Panelists include Tanya Huff, Merrie Destefano, Jocelynn Drake, Richard Kadrey, Lauren Kate, and Marjorie M. Liu.
Moderated by Diana Gill, executive editor at HarperCollins.
Signing afterwards 4-5PM, Sails Pavilion.
Saturday, July 24, 2:30-3:30PM
Adapting Words to Pictures
Saturday, July 24, 4:30-5:30PM
Military in Comics
See you there!
Labels: Charlie Huston, Comic Con, DASFA, Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, Sweet Action
¶ posted by Mario Acevedo @ 6:19 PM 5 comments
