I am presently re-acquainting myself with the third-person viewpoint. I’d never written anything in first person until I wrote The Second Duchess, and I found I really loved the sense of seeing and feeling and touching and tasting right along with Barbara and Lucrezia, and also with my beloved Rinette in The Flower Reader. But The Alchemist Prince is turning out to be a different animal altogether. There’s so much happening to so many fascinating people that there’s no way one (or even two or three) characters can be present for all of it. And I want it all—I can’t bear to leave any of it out…

Cressie is doing beautifully. She had another follow-up vet visit on Wednesday and Dr. Clawson (such an appropriate name for a vet!) pronounced her a champion healer. She’s still wearing her plastic bag (an invention of my own, of which I’m justly proud) and probably will be for another week at least, just to let the healing progress past the itchy stage. Here she is, “in the bag” and oh-so-bored with it all:

Boudin has been feeling quite left out, and so here’s a wonderful new picture of him as well, snapped by the Broadcasting Legend™:

In Second Duchess news, there’s a giveaway slated to start on January 15th on Goodreads. Twenty-five copies up for grabs! So mark your calendars to enter. And anyone in the Houston, Texas area—put a big red “X” on March 5th, because at 1:00 on that Saturday afternoon I’ll be signing at Houston’s iconic Murder by the Book bookstore.

My Link o’ the Week for writers: StoryFix from Larry Brooks. As Larry says in his subtitle: “Get it written, get it right, get it published.” A great resource, packed with energizing information.

My Link o’ the Week for historical fun: The page on Lochleven Castle in the Douglas Archives. I particularly like the sketch of what Lochleven Island would have looked like in the mid-1560s at the time of my story—the island today is much larger because the level of the loch has lowered. Lochleven! Just the word is embroidered with history and romance…

I have three elements to my work—three strands. Writing, reading, and promotion. I should call it something other than “promotion.” Connecting. Making friends. Socializing. Heh. But that’s actually what it is. Getting out in the world. I could visualize all this as taking place in three settings—my sunny, private office, full of plants and inspiring pictures, where no one bothers me and I can write with the beagles curled up at my feet; a comfortable chair by a window with a tall glass of iced tea and a stack of books on the table beside me; and a busy, colorful marketplace rather like the wonderful old Olla Podrida in North Dallas, or Guadalupe Street in Austin, or Scarborough Faire down in Waxahatchie. Or a fantasy eastern bazaar. This represents kind of a progression of interaction, too—my writing room is completely private, while the reading nook is out in the house where other people sometimes wander by, and the worldwide bazaar is crammed with interesting people, some I know and millions I don’t.

My motivate-myself links of the week (which might help you motivate yourself as well):

The Willpower Engine: The Tipping Point of a Habit

Illuminated Mind: When You Have Everything You Need But Think You Don’t

Answer to question: what do the weird combinations of “I” and numbers mean in my post titles? It’s just shorthand for “Volume I, number 9.” I think I’ll start volume II with my first post in January.

Just a reminder that the release date of The Second Duchess has been changed to March 1, 2011. Two more months to wait but for a really good reason. Can’t explain quite yet. Mark your calendars!

Reading this week: finished Dark Road to Darjeeling by Deanna Raybourn. Simply wonderful, as have been all her Lady Julia Grey books, and highly recommended—a new and exotic setting, a crop of deliciously eccentric characters, and of course the working-out of the newly-married relationship between Lady Julia and Nicholas Brisbane. Boo gives it five aroos, and adds that he considers his profile quite as handsome as Mr. Brisbane’s. He’s also giving his “I am the Lord and Master” stare to Cressie, who’s trying to get into the picture to tell everyone to know how much she loves the gorgeous cover.

What I cooked this week: chili. Fall is here and it’s cooler and I just craved chili with a crusty baguette. I have three secrets to chili: flour, beer, and molasses. Sound weird? Read on.

First, I mix the spices (chili powder, cumin, this ‘n’ that) with a little flour (masa harina, or fine corn flour, preferred, but plain white flour will do in a pinch) and add the spice-flour mixture to the cooked crumbled beef before adding any other liquid. When I stir it creates a sort of roux which makes the chili deliciously thick. Second, a can of beer is the first liquid I add after the flour-spices mixture. Sometimes I just stop there for all-beef, non-tomato chili (the Broadcasting Legend’s™ favorite). Third, if I’m using tomatoes, I also add a tablespoon or so of molasses. You know how you sometimes add a little sugar to Italian-style tomato sauces, to smooth out the acidity? Well, molasses does the same thing for tomatoes in chili and it’s a deeper, richer flavor.

Wrist x-rays: no news. Pain is manageable but I really wish we could get this figured out and fixed.

Writing: Writing a book is damn hard work. That’s all I have to say about that.

And finally, I am the guest editor for the Autumn 2010 issue of Solander, the magazine of the Historical Novel Society. (This is a mostly honorary title and the real editors do all the real work.) Solander features interviews, articles, short fiction and commentary, and is the only such magazine in the world for enthusiasts of historical fiction. It is fantastic. To subscribe, join the Historical Novel Society today.

I playacted as a child. I sewed endless outfits for my Ginny doll (this was pre-Barbie, thank God, when dolls for little girls still looked like little girls) and played out stories with her. I acted out endless stories with paper dolls, plastic horses, and my poor hapless sister and friends. I loved wonderful adventurous and romantic stories (usually in some historical setting) and imagined them vividly, but didn’t think so much about writing them down. I did draw pictures. Most of my family was musical, and so I proudly proclaimed myself to be “artical.” It didn’t occur to me to imagine myself as “writical.”

For a while I actually thought I wanted to be an actress. (See evidence, right.) Then I got sidetracked into radio and started acting out stories with voices and sound effects in endless “slice-of-life” commercials. It was only much later that it seriously occurred to me to actually write down a story. And when I did, it came out as—well, playacting on paper. And that is what I’m doing, to this day. I act out the parts as I write, much to the amusement of the Broadcasting Legend™ and the puzzlement of the beagles.

And I wanted to be Beth in Little Women. Everybody loved her! I wanted everybody to love me! And anyway, what actress can resist a good death scene?

“A Few Things the Salty Ones Taught Me,” by Barbara Samuel.

Go read it. It’s brilliant.

1. Write every day. (Momentum is everything.)
2. Work alone. (Editor and agent are exceptions.)
3. Read widely.
4. Never lose your sense of gratitude and wonder.
5. In fact, just get over yourself in general.
6. Be discreet.
7. Be generous.
8. Mind your manners.
9. Have fun.

What is your writer’s code? If you’re not a writer, what is your personal code?

To whom do these lovely and mysterious arms belong? (No, not the Venus de Milo, silly.) Who is sitting on our couch playing with Cressie and Boo? Why, it’s Agent Diana, in town for a conference and here to spend some very intense time discussing The Silver Casket.

It was wonderful to meet Agent D. face-to-face for the first time. We devoured incredible prime steaks, exotic chocolates steeped in fruit and liqueurs; saganaki, spanokopita and tzatziki; and lovely cupcakes. Did we do anything but eat? Heh. Well, yes. We spent hours talking about The Silver Casket, books, The Second Duchess, books, the conference, books, promotion and bookstores, and oh yes—books.

Agent D. is now on her way back to New York after waving a sad goodbye to the beagle duo, and I’m on my way back to my hermitage to write up notes on everything we talked about…

<edit> <edit> <edit> <coffee> <edit> <rewrite> <rewrite> <tear out hair> <rewrite> <edit> <edit> <write new stuff> <write new stuff> <write fantastic new stuff> <run up and down hall shouting whoo-hoo!> <scare doggies> <edit> <edit> <edit> <coffee> <edit> <edit> <edit> <edit>……..

“If only you’d remember before you ever sit down to write that you’ve been a reader long before you were ever a writer. You simply fix that fact in your mind, then sit very still and ask yourself, as a reader, what piece of writing in all the world Buddy Glass would want to read if he had his heart’s choice. The next step is terrible, but so simple I can hardly believe it as I write it. You just sit down shamelessly and write the thing yourself.” —From Seymour: An Introduction.