Five For Monday

Just a couple quick updates today.

1. I chose 25 winners for the Ace/Roc samper collection.  You can check here to see if you won, then please email me your address and I’ll mail it off to you.  Thank you to those who have already sent me addresses.  I will be stuffing envelopes tonight!

2. We have a large yard.  I love that.  Our old house was built back when the lots were customarily bigger, but even so it is a generous chunk of property.  And with our generous chunk of property come some drawbacks.  Like weeding, which really isn’t “weeding” as much as full-out war.  I spent my one day off in oh, maybe three months, with the gas mask, machete, and shovel staging a full-frontal assault on the greenery trying to devour our house.  I do this every year even though I have hideous allergies that make this a grueling experience.  But when the yard looks nice, it is all worth it.

3. The yard doesn’t look nice yet.  I lost the battle. Don’t worry, there’s still the war.  Hear that, blackberries and ivy? You are so going down.

4. MAGIC WITHOUT MERCY, book 8 in the Allie Beckstrom series is done and off to my editor.  Yay!  Some huge surprises hit in this book, and other really cool things happen.  I can’t wait to hear if she likes it!  (This book comes out April 2012, after MAGIC ON THE LINE comes out in November)

5. Speaking of books coming out, DEAD IRON will be out in 8 days!  LESS—I mean one day more, see, I can do math– THAN A WEEK!!!!  I am having my normal complete panic, that will soon calm to excitement, and then joy.  If you want to get a signed copy, I will be at MURDER BY THE BOOK in Huston on July 6th, and I will be wearing my new (thrifted) steampunk outfit and giving away goodies.  Hope to see you there.