What We're Writing: Jenn's in Copyedit Mode

 JENN McKINLAY: One of my favorite phases of book producing is the copy edits. Hopefully when the edits arrive, enough time has passed that I've forgotten the book and can now look at it with fresh eyes. I am currently working on the edits for WITCHES OF QUESTIONABLE INTENT and I just got the cover art, which is absolutely stunning but I can't share the whole cover yet. 

I can, however, share an itty bitty piece of it and I'll share a snippet of the story so you know what the glimpse of cover refers to. 

Here's the bit of the cover:

 

So, who/what is this little fella? Here's the snippet from a scene where the protagonist Zoe is visiting a magical midnight market: 

     I glanced around Marvello’s trove of items. There were clocks, mirrors, sets of dishes, maps, lanterns and books…so many books. It was easy to see why Tariq loved Marv’s booth the most. I began to sort through the titles of books, looking for items of interest. I was reaching for a volume on a nearby shelf when a tiny flicker of flame shot out at my fingers followed by a puff of smoke.

     “Ouch!” The flame had grazed my finger but hadn’t burned me. “Marv, I don’t want to alarm you. but I think there’s a fire in your books!”

     “Oh, no!” Marv and Tariq hurried over to the shelf.

     “Right there!” I pointed. Sure enough another little lick of flame appeared.

     Marv laughed and said, “Oh, don’t worry that’s a bookwyrm hatchling.”

    Tariq noted my confusion and explained, “A baby dragon.”

    I clapped my hand against the side of my head a few times as if I was trying to dislodge water. “I’m sorry, could you repeat that because it sounded like you said a baby dragon?”

     “I did.” Tariq gestured to where Marv was moving aside books and reaching into the shelf.

     I felt my jaw drop when Marv pulled his hand out of the opening and pinched between his thumb and forefinger by the scruff of its neck was a tiny black dragon, no bigger than a baseball.

     “That’s not…you’re pranking me,” I said.

     “Hold out your hand,” Marv said. “This little fellow is named Titus. He won’t hurt you.”
     My hand shook a little bit but I held it palm up and Marv dropped the bookwyrm hatchling into it. The little fellow stretched his neck, sniffing the air between us. He was stupid cute and I desperately wanted to pet him or squeeze him, but I didn’t want to terrorize him as he was so tiny, so I didn’t do anything.

     He circled my palm, his tail twitching and his tiny leathery wings flapping, like a dog trying to settle into the best position for a nap. Once he settled, he folded up his wings and tucked in his tail. A puff of smoke came out of his tiny nose and he closed his eyes. I would have thought I was hallucinating but I could feel the pin pricks of his tiny talons on my palm, his steady heartbeat, and his slow inhale and exhale.

     “But…I don’t…isn’t it dangerous to have a little guy who emits fire near all of your books?” I asked.

     “Oh, he’s not the only one,” Marv said. “I have five bookwyrms. They eat mold and dust, and they’re fire is like witch fire where it doesn’t burn but it does clean the books quite nicely.”

This is one of those moments where I desperately wish that what I write could be real. Wouldn't it be cool to have a bookwyrm, maybe two to keep each other company, on your bookcase? 

Reds and Readers, what/who/where is something you've read in a book that you wish was real?

WITCHES OF QUESTIONABLE INTENT comes out Nov 10th. It was originally Oct 27th, so who knows if it will move again, but it'll be this autumn either way. Here's a more detailed description: 

A librarian witch must use her bookish knowledge to track down a dangerous, magical tome, in this enchanting novel from New York Times bestselling author Jenn McKinlay.

Thanks to her training as a librarian and her newfound magical abilities, Zoe Ziakas thinks she has a handle on her job at the Museum of Literature safeguarding the secret collection of enchanted tomes known as the Books of Dubious Origin. But when Jasper Griffin—the colleague she’s been crushing on—reports that their most volatile acquisition, The Book of Shadows, has been stolen, Zoe’s carefully cataloged world unravels.

This isn’t just any magical text. It carries unquestionable power, twisting truth into illusion and turning allies into enemies. Once its power is unleashed, no one can trust what they see or who they are.

To track down the book, Zoe, Jasper, and the rest of the BODO team plunge into a perilous hunt that takes them from shadowy midnight markets to demon-infested streets, all while wrangling an unpredictable hellhound puppy. But when the thief begins to invoke the book’s darkest spells, Zoe faces an impossible challenge: How does she stop a curse that can rewrite reality itself?

If she can’t separate fact from fiction, the story won’t just end—it will be erased.

What We're Writing Week: Julia is Catching Up and Checking Out

 JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Don't be alarmed by the title; I'm not checking out of hotels or my day to day activities. I used the phrase because I love me some alliteration, and the writing I've been doing lately is all of a sort - reaching out to readers.

 

I have to admit, when I was pouring over issues of WRITERS DIGEST and reading mystery novels to learn the craft, I never expected the life of the author to involve so much, well, communication. Ironically, many of us are well suited as writers because we love to sit in a small room by ourselves and not have to talk to anyone. We're not misanthropes - a visit to any mystery conference will disabuse you of that idea - but we all like spending a lot of interior time. I suppose if we didn't turn to the written word, a lot of us would do well as contemplative monks (although Jenn and Hank and Rhys would be HIGHLY energetic ascetics.)

 

But I began my career at the dawn of the social media age. The first change was the author website, which enabled readers, for the first time, to connect to their favorite writers without showing up at a bookstore or library. As more and more people got online, we switched from physical newsletters (yes! I had one, done by a lovely local printing business!) to email newsletters. 

 

Then came the social media sites that are now part of our day-to-day lives. I can't recall if anyone was using MySpace professionally (anyone remember how big MySpace was for about five minutes?) but once Facebook stopped being just for college students, the whole world joined up, and authors came in droves as well. Then, for a while, the novelty of YouTube meant Book Trailers - a whole business popped up around producing them! Facebook stayed, and grew, but YouTube was quickly colonized by content producers putting out stuff that was, let's face it, much more entertaining than book trailers, so authors migrated to the cool new world of Instagram.

 

You also had to be on Goodreads, and LibraryThing, and everyone became bloggers, and it was about then when you'd start to hear writers huddled together at conferences asking each other how much social media was the right amount, and how did everyone manage to get any actual, you know, writing done while also posting and mailing and Tweeting and commenting.

 

Don't even get me started on Tik Tok. No. Not gonna go there.

 

Most of us have settled down to a few, reliable ways to connect with our readers, in part because EVERYONE has gotten a bit tired and jaded with the social media world. Quality, not quantity, has become the new standard. Which leads me to my catching up - on FB comments and writers' emails, and checking out - other authors' newsletters, because I'm restarting my own NEWS FROM THE KILL and I want to make sure it's up to date; ie, giving readers what they want and nothing they don't.

 

So, dear readers, tell me: what sites online do you find gives you the best value when interacting with writers? And, if you subscribe to any, what do you like to see in author newsletters?

And Debs Is...Still Writing

DEBORAH CROMBIE: The last several times What We're Writing has rolled around, I've sworn that Kincaid/James #20 was ALMOST finished and that the next time I checked in, I'd be able to show you a neatly typed THE END.

But, no, alas, I am still writing.

The pages are piling up (yes, I do still print manuscript pages, because I always find mistakes in printed copy that I don't see on the screen, and as a "just in case" because even though I back up regularly, digital catastrophes do happen.) I still use the manuscript format I was taught as a very newbie writer, Courier, double-spaced, twenty-five lines a page, which averages 250 words a page. My current page count is 503, or roughly 125 thousand words, and I am imagining the publisher's horror as they are calculating the cost of paper and printing–this is a very big deal.

And I am not finished.

Actually, this book is not all that long for me. The first draft of A KILLING OF INNOCENTS clocked in at 650 pages, which my then-editor happily slashed by a hundred pages, I'm sure making it a much better book in the process. WATER LIKE A STONE was long, as was NECESSARY AS BLOOD, but GARDEN OF LAMENTATIONS takes the cake–it was so long that my editor said it should have been two books, and it is my longest published book to date.

I suspect this current book has another 50 or so pages to go, and then we'll see what comes out in the wash, so to speak. It's pretty terrifying, I have to admit, working with a new editor and not really knowing what to expect.

It's also scary, so close to the end, to wonder if the finished book will live up to that "Platonic book" I first conceived. I've filled three spiral notebooks with notes, and now I'm wondering what bits of all those ideas I've left out. And there are so many series characters I love that I just couldn't squeeze into this book–not unless I want it to run double that 500 pages!

I am excited to be so close to the end, and frustrated that I can't write it faster. 

And now for some really good news!

Kincaid/James #20 is scheduled for publication in Winter '27! I don't have the exact date yet, but things are moving fast. Cover art is in the works! 

And it looks like my working title is going to stand, so the book is called

 

THE LONG COLD SLEEP

You can see I'm really under the gun! 

Dear Reds and readers, how do you feel about long books? I know you can get away with really long novels in sci-fi and fantasy, and in historical fiction or family sagas, but how do you like your crime novels? I worry that if a book isn't long enough, my readers will feel cheated.