The Altar of Inspiration

A friend was talking not long ago about his “creative altar” and I got to thinking about how I keep a number of trinkets around my office. Some might say for luck, others for inspiration. So here’s a picture of some of my most important knickknacks I keep around my desk, and what each one means:

First, and most important, is Miss Kitty—the porcelain cat. You may recognize her—she had a cameo appearance in Legend of the Jade Dragon. I first got Miss Kitty when I was seven. I traded a friend—I remember her name was Brenda—a necklace that I had for Miss Kitty. I loved that necklace, it was goldtone flowers with purple centers to them, but I loved Miss Kitty more and I wanted her. Miss Kitty has been my writing mascot for many, many, many years, and whenever I’ve moved, she’s the first thing I carefully pack away in my office, and she’s in the first box I unpack.

You’ll see three dragons here—one of rosewood, I believe—and it’s a Feng shui symbol of prosperity. The second is fluorite, and it represents the dragon out of Legend of the Jade Dragon. And the third is brass and he represents Smoky out of the Sister’s series. I love dragons and have figurines all over the house of them.

A few crystals are included—one of my crystal balls, rutilated quartz, which helps me clear my head when I need to. An obsidian obelisk which wards off energy drain by others, a polished quartz crystal spike which helps me increase my focus, a smaller unpolished quartz crystal spike and a small piece of amethyst (I love quartz).

I have a set of Russian nesting dolls given to me by a lovely young Russian woman who worked with my husband for awhile. And several dangly charms—one has a little pin that says “Goddess”—a gift from a friend, and one of my pentacles on it that represent my magic coming into my work. The other is a bracelet my mentor had made for me some years back out of old typewriter keys that spell out my name—I love that and keep that hanging by the computer, and on the end of it, I attached a “Y” charm for my name.

I also keep a bottle of peppermint lotion nearby for my hands, because the smell of peppermint wakes me up and revives me, and I keep Listerine strips on hand at all times because they’ve replaced the Altoids my dentist made me stop eating (I chewed them and they were hurting my teeth and jaw).

All of these things mean a great deal to me—they’re little, really, tchotchkes, but they signify friends and inspiration and mystical creatures and magic and mentorship and smell-goods.You may not even realize some of the things you have around are actually little charms to make the day easier. So what do you keep near your workplace for inspiration?

Yasmine

2010 When Darkness Falls--Tony at his best!

Want a chance to see Camille and Delilah in slightly different poses? My cover artist, Tony Mauro, has his 2010 calendar ready to go and it’s beautiful—and it has alternative poses of Camille from Dragon Wytch and Delilah from Night Huntress in it, as well as ten other gorgeous, fantastical women.

Check out Tony’s site—if you buy it from his site, he says he’ll autograph the calendar!

Yasmine

Interviewed my editor...

...over at the Witchy Chicks today!

Yasmine

Book Signing Saturday the 26th

Apparently I have a booksigning on Saturday, September 26th at 2:00 PM. Mercury retrograde and a computer glitch on the other end kind of ate the emails confirming this so I assumed it wasn’t going to happen and didn’t advertise, but it is, and I am! LOL

I’ll be at: Barnes & Noble, 300 Andover Park W #200, Tukwila, WA 98188 And I’ll be answering questions about the books, perhaps reading a page or two from The Shadow of Mist (from Never After), and generally just chatting away. If you’re around please come say hi!

Interview with Samwise....

Blogging over at Fire & Ice today--drop by and say hi!

And the Wheel Turns...

Blogging over at the Witchy Chicks today...drop on by!

What I'm Reading

People ask me if I read this or that author, almost always within the genre I’m writing, and they seem surprised when I say no, that I have my favorites but I mostly read outside the urban fantasy/paranormal romance genre. The truth is, I write what I most want to read within the genre. I write it because it’s not there, otherwise. While there are some excellent authors in UF that I really enjoy reading, I don’t read the majority because they’re not writing just what I want to read. So what else do I read besides my very fave UF authors?

Well, I read mysteries, thrillers, suspense, paranormal suspense, horror, some fantasy, some SF—especially harder cyberpunk, some romance (mostly gothics), some classics, a few literary

authors, narrative nonfiction, true crime, and hmmm…scattered other books.

I find that I can’t read a lot of UF when I’m writing it—don’t want any random thought ideas to be plucked up, for one thing, but for another—I need a break from the time I put into writing it, so I read elsewhere. I just wish I had more time to read—an occupational hazard of being a writer.

My TBR pile looks like a creeping mass o’ doom right now—at least 200 books on it waiting for me to get to. I cringe, but keep buying them. It’s like this desperate belief that somehow, by buying the books, time will suddenly open up for me to read them. Good for the authors I buy, not so good for my increasing lack of bookspace and wallet. But—I’ll keep buying.
So today’s book of choice (I’m actually carving out some reading time right now) is Sweet Revenge by Diane Mott Davidson. What are you reading right now?

Yasmine

Limited Quantity of Postcards Left

Limited quantity of most Otherworld postcards available: http://bit.ly/KKHfR

Witchling postcards no longer available.

If you want Moon Stalkers swag, you have one month to send in for a swag bag. After that--postcards will only be available of the current book. Bookmarks will still be available.

So get your SASE's in to me by the end of October (and go look at the link to find out more info, don't ask me how to here, please. ~grins~)

Autumn Musings

Today I nixed hanging out online and working for a couple of hours spent driving around with my husband. First we went to Marymoor Park, which is a beautiful area not too far from where we live, and just sat and listened to the breeze in the trees and talked and it was so nice to be out, where I could smell living things and not just printer fumes.

Then we were driving around looking at neighborhoods near where we live, because in the next year or two we plan to buy a house. Houses in our area start at around 500K—which is why we haven’t been able to buy one yet. So we were just rambling through neighborhoods, talking over potential plans, and enjoying the light breeze on a warm early-autumn day.

And I looked up at this row of trees, and saw that the leaves had changed color. About 30% along this one street have turned yellow, and the breeze was strong enough that some were beginning to fall off the trees. And all of a sudden, I had my proof of what I’ve known for a few weeks: autumn’s here. Autumn is here and we are seeing her gently come in, but soon she’ll hit like she did last week, with rain and cool weather and fog, and this time there won’t be anymore nice days to sprinkle in between the incessant cloud cover. And that’s okay with me.

In our area, autumn’s has a personality. The mist rises and rolls along with roads, filling gullies and ravines. The clouds hang low and the ever present dripping of raindrops from the firs and cedars is a calming sound. We seldom get brilliantly colored autumn leaves—once the rain hits they pile in sodden masses in the gutters and cause urban flooding if they aren’t cleaned out often enough.

Autumn speaks to me of mystery and magic, of my D’Artigo sisters hunting demons in the chill Seattle night, of my new series—the Indigo Court series—with Cicely and Rhiannon, the magical cousins who must face the dread queen Myst and her army of dangerous and seductive hunters.

What’s the autumn season like where you live? Do you think of dark carnivals and mysterious strangers and trolls hiding in the mist like we do here? Or is your autumn of a different flavor?

Yasmine

Final Playlist for Harvest Hunting

I've finetuned the playlist for Harvest Hunting (OW, book 8: Delilah's POV), so here it is (and as usual, it's a long one):

Beck:
Farewell Ride
Nausea

Bravery, The: Believe
Cher: The Beat Goes On
Chester Bennington: System
Cobra Verde: Don't Play With Fire
David Bowie: Golden Years
Deftones: Change (In the House of Flies)

Evans Blue: Cold

Everlast:
What It's like
Mercy on My Soul

Fleetwood Mac: The Chain

Gabrielle Roth:
Black Mesa
Zone Unknown

Gary Numan:
Innocence Bleeding
Dominion Day
Down in the Park
Dream Killer
Hybrid
My Shadow in Vain
Prophecy
She's Got Claws
Stormtrooper in Drag
The Angel Wars
Tread Careful

Heather Alexander:
Blood Brothers
Fallen Angel
March of Cambreadth
Camden Town
Wolfen One

Jace Everett: Bad Things
Jay Gordon: Slept So Long

Jethro Tull:
Mountain Men
No Lullaby
Rocks on the Road

King Black Acid:
One and Only
Soul Systems Burn

Lee Dorsey: Give it Up
Little Big Town: Bones
Low and tomandandy: Half Light

Nirvana:
Lake of Fire
Plataeu

Oingo Boingo:
Nothing to Fear
Home Again
Elevator Man
Deadman’s Party

Ringo Starr: It Don't Come Easy
Sarah McLachlan: Possession
Simple Minds: Don't You (Forget About Me)
Steeleye Span: Blackleg Miner

Tangerine Dream:
Beaver Town
Dr. Destructo
Grind

Tina Turner: I Can't stand the Rain

Tori Amos:
Blood Roses
Muhammad My Friend

Warchild: Ash A

Zero Seven: In the Waiting Line

Blogging over at Fire & Ice Today

http://fireandiceauthors.blogspot.com/

For a peek into how I convince myself to get moving.

Yasmine

Reader Questions Answered!

The Sisters and Iris enter the parlor, dressed in what looks like working clothes.

Camille’s wearing a sleek long sleeved black catsuit, a low slung silver belt and a pair of leather, knee-high books with 4” stilettos, an outfit you haven’t seen before. She blinks and you sense a swirl of magic around her.

Delilah’s dressed in black jeans, a long-sleeve olive green sweater, leather jacket, and a pair of Doc Marten’s Jazz Jemma Eye Zip Boots. There’s something a little odd about her tonight—something different—but you can’t quite tell what.

Menolly’s wearing a cerulean turtleneck, pair of tight indigo jeans, a denim jacket and a pair of stiletto ankle boots. She grins and her fangs are showing, gleaming white in the dim light of the parlor.

Iris is dressed in a navy skirt with silver threads running through it that sweeps her ankles, a form-fitting white cowl-necked sweater, and her ankle-length golden hair is swept up into a cascading ponytail. Even she seems different—more serious, preoccupied with something.

Iris: “Sit and be welcome. We don’t have long to talk today, but please, have some tea and cookies.” *She offers you a cup of tea in a bone china teacup and the plate of peanut butter cookies.*

Camille: We’re heading out to a major goblin and demon fight here but we’re happy to take a moment to answer a few questions. Who’s first?

HockeyVampiress: “How is the portal in the back yard doing?”

Menolly: “We’ll have to do something about it soon. We’ve managed to get Father to assign one of the new recruits to the Des’Estar over here to keep an eye on it for us while we’re off fighting the enemy. We are hoping to find a way to repair the rogue portals but as you’ll see in Bone Magic, there are things interfering with the idea.”

HeofHiShirts: “Here's a question for Iris: how do you manage to keep the household as clean (and all the people fed) as you do?”

Iris: “Sigh…I suppose it’s natural that everybody seems to think of me as the housekeeper—that’s what it seems like I do right now, but I wish people would understand that wasn’t always the focus of my life. But how can you, considering I’ve kept my past a secret until now? Know this: in Bone Magic I finally break down and begin telling my story.

“However, to the question at hand: magic helps. It’s not so hard with all the household charms I learned over the years. Plus, an overturned cat box on a bed often helps remind a certain werecat to clean up her own mess. I also employ my charms and wiles to get the men around here to help—what a houseful now, and a well-placed smile and a threat to boycott cooking does wonders on getting the crew to roll up their sleeves and pitch in.

[whispering] “Actually, the men are better about helping than the girls—although when it all comes out in the wash, we all do a lot of work and we keep this place running without too many problems.”

Jan: “Camille, do you remember your first spell you tried and how did it backfire?”

Camille: “Oh gods…well, the first spell I tried didn’t backfire, but the second one sure did. The first spell I managed to cast was when I was young and the Coterie had first taken me on. This is before we realized that my powers were a little haywire. That came soon enough. The first spell I cast…my master told me to create a little ball of light in my hand by channeling the Moon Mother’s energy through me. So I did. And it worked—little ball of energy floating in the palm of my hand. I was so proud. Hey, it felt like the world was my oyster and I was just going to gather up all the pearls.

The second spell, however…I was instructed to levitate a bag that was submerged in Lake Y’Leveshan (by the way, that’s pronounced Ee-Lev-eh-shan) out of the water. Well, I focused on bringing the bag up to me, and the next thing I knew, I was under the water with the bag, struggling to breathe. I could swim but I was so taken by surprise that I began to sink, fighting to breathe. Luckily Nigel, my teacher, was quick enough to use his magic to bring me up—I was a ways down—but if he hadn’t been on the ball, I would have died. So yes, my backfires can be dangerous. I learned that early on.

Jan: “Delilah, which form do you prefer? Werecat or panther? Why?”

Delilah: “Both, depending on my mood. Sometimes I prefer being my tabby-self—Tabby is for fun, for running through the woods, for chasing mice (though never Misha or her family), for exploring strange places and climbing trees and raising havoc. At first, Panther scared me, but I’ve come to love the dark predator side of myself. I love the hunt, the chase, and I have to say, I’m coming to appreciate the victory of the catch and kill. I like the take-charge attitude I have as my panther-self, and trust me, nobody messes with me then. I don’t like being thought of as naïve but I think that part of myself is fading into the past and my sisters are beginning to realize it. Tabby and Panther are both predators, of course, tied by their feline nature. And that is coming out in my two-legged form as well.

[The women stand]

We’re sorry to cut this short but we have to take off for the fight, and Iris has to hold down the fort here. Thanks for coming, feel free to ask us more questions—no spoilers of course—here, or on Twitter. You can find us there at http://www.twitter.com/SOTM_Sisters

What It Is...Got Some Blood Work Back

So the preliminary results of my bloodwork are in. The lower carb no-starch diet is working: my AC-1 blood sugar panel is dropping and I’m turning around the pre-diabetes (and no, I’m not giving you my numbers—none of anybody’s business). My thyroid levels are still way off so we’re upping my thyroid medicine. Which is no surprise to me because I’ve been thinking I’m not on enough—skin’s still terribly dry, still get the afternoon slump even though I’m not eating starch now and that always puts me to sleep. Cholesterol, triglycerides, all that are good. Still somewhat B and B12 deficient, and Vitamin D hasn’t come in yet.

What it amounts to is that I’m moving in the right direction but no wonder I still feel under the weather a lot. I’m hoping the new level of thyroid medicine works and I rebound on it.

Whatever the case, the fact that I’m inching back from diabetes—that I’m not edging toward it anymore—gives me strong motivation to stay on this diet and make it work. Yes, I want to lose weight (and am again, starting to see a bit of loss)—I’ve never been ‘thin’ and never will be, don’t expect it, but I’d like to drop about six-seven more sizes. I wouldn’t be ‘thin’ but I’d be comfortable and happy with that. Mostly, I want my body to respond again without chronic pain, without feeling sluggish. Working out with a friend once a week and trying to get in 1-2 more workouts during the week will hopefully help too.

And before anybody offers advice contrary to what my doctor and I’ve been doing: please don’t. I’m not asking for advice. I’m just filling you in on my life at this point. I'm kind of grumpy due to the diet, it's not fun and easy, so just bear with me on Twitter, etc., as I do my best to find my equilibrium in this long-term endeavor.

No new recipes right now, but will be playing with some stevia-sweetened nut-flour recipes soon. So we’ll see where that goes.