Category: livejournal entry

I cannot count on eating dinner while watching “Bones.” Particularly not when my chosen dinner is pizza, and the victim was — well, like the one last night. Will I never learn?

Between being very, very busy and having a cold this week, I have not been posting or replying to e-mail as quickly as I should have been. But good things are happening! Stargazer is in its third week on the NYT bestsellers’ list (woo!), I got to visit the HarperCollins offices for a little celebration party on Monday and I am still neck-deep in fiction, writing hard. I hope to catch up on a few more things before I leave for England in — great cats, just a week and a day. Normally I plan my packing way in advance of a trip (I don’t do checked luggage), and this time, I have only the vaguest idea what’s going on. Better dive into the laundry this weekend, unless I want to spend a week sauntering about the United Kingdom in my pajamas.

I am not sure if I’ll have time to do this before my trip, but I was thinking of doing a liveblog/twitter feed of my watching a horror movie. Specifically, the horror movie that had an ad so terrifying that it freaked me out for more than 30 years: “It’s Alive.” I can remember seeing the first TV commercial for that movie and being almost paralyzed with fright; some IMDB searching reveals that I saw this when I was 3 years old. So it’s one of my first memories, actually. When I saw that the long-dreaded “It’s Alive” was airing on cable, I recorded it, intending to face down my old fears and hoping that it just looks cheesy now. (If it is still frightening, I may never recover.) Would anyone out there be interested in reading along with this exposure of my inner demons, and/or MST3King of a creepy old movie?

(I’m going to watch it regardless; this is just to find out if my secret terror will be private or public.)

I promised I would let you guys know when I had it — and now I sort of do, though not very concretely; all I have are months, not actual release dates, and not even all of those. But I thought I would share what I had, for what it’s worth.

SPAIN: You get STARGAZER in both Spanish and Catalan in May 2009. I have started to hear from some people who might have it already, though I don’t know if they are getting US versions. So far, neither the Spanish nor Catalan publisher has bought the rights to HOURGLASS and AFTERLIFE. I know it’s sold well over there, so I’m optimistic, but I can’t give you any release dates past STARGAZER because, right now, they don’t exist.

AUSTRALIA: You get STARGAZER in July 2009. The Australian publisher has purchased the rights to the full series, so HOURGLASS and AFTERLIFE will be headed your way, but I think the time frame is not yet established.

ITALY: EVERNIGHT appears in Italian this month! The Italian publisher will also be releasing STARGAZER, but I have no date for it, and HOURGLASS and AFTERLIFE have not been purchased by them yet.

GERMANY: EVERNIGHT will come out in Germany/German-speaking countries in June 2009. The German publisher has bought rights to all four books, but I have no other release dates yet.

FRANCE: The French publisher has the rights to EVERNIGHT and STARGAZER. I don’t have dates for those yet. The final two in the series are not yet sold to them.

HUNGARY: EVERNIGHT is coming out in Hungarian! I don’t know when, nor whether they will want the other three books, but I find it very cool nonetheless.

That’s all I know right now — hope it answers a few of your questions. Either the publishers themselves or your local bookstore chains might be able to provide more clarification.

As for the U.S.A., Harper finally settled on a once-a-year schedule for the series. So HOURGLASS will be out in early spring 2010, and AFTERLIFE will appear in early spring 2011. I know, I know, it seems like forever! I wish they were coming out faster too, but with STARGAZER in its second week on the NYT list (woo!), they must know what they’re doing.

I am loving the entries I am getting for STARGAZER Contest #7! I hope to post links to several sometime this weekend. And by the way, winners to contest #6, Zazzle held up shipping the prizes forever, but they should finally be on their way.

I am thanking each and every one of you who helped make STARGAZER — (::drumroll::) — #4 on The New York Times Bestseller List for chapter books!

It’s not in the paper yet, and I’m sort of confused still about when it will be, but the announcement came out last night, at which point dianafox, my editor and dianora2 all phoned in short order. So of course I haven’t come down from Cloud Nine yet. Seriously, thanks to all of you who have read and loved the books and told your friends; you are the ones who do the most to help authors make these lists, and I’m so thankful. (I have some news to share about upcoming books, too, but I’ll post that tomorrow or early next week.)

Weirdly, my tiara and limousine had not materialized this morning when I woke up. I shall be on the lookout.

IMPORTANT VAMPIRE BULLETIN

IAN SOMERHOLDER HAS BEEN CAST AS DAMON IN ‘THE VAMPIRE DIARIES.’

CUE HYPERVENTILATING GLEE BY CLAUDIA GRAY

END TRANSMISSION

Yes, it’s March 24 — release day at last! Although plenty of you managed to find STARGAZER in your local bookstores ahead of time, all of you should be able to find it now. I’m tired and relieved and thrilled: You name it.

I also picked the winners for STARGAZER Contest #6 this morning. Congrats to Christine M., Tori W., Ornella S., Lauralee W., Deltay, Hannah G., Jackie D., Moriah D., Misty H. and Jessica J.! Their lucky charms were the luckiest of all. Though it was interesting how many different theories of luck you all had — plenty of people don’t believe in it at all (including a couple of the contest winners!), while others have some pretty elaborate rituals. Interestingly, the most common good-luck talismans were things that people wear on their bodies: rings, pendants, pieces of clothing, tattoos, etc. I think we feel best with good-luck charms we can keep with us all the time.

Next up will be STARGAZER Contest #7! This one will last a lot longer — six weeks, to be exact, with me picking a winner on May 5 (to make a very merry Cinco de Mayo for someone). And it’s for the same grand prize as last time: the winner will get to name a character in AFTERLIFE, the final book in the EVERNIGHT series!

How do you enter? Help spread the word about STARGAZER by posting online! It can be a notice in your blog, a conversation in a books forum, a review in your LJ or on Amazon, whatever. Just post, send me a link to what you’ve posted at evernightclaudia at gmail dot com with the subject line “STARGAZER Contest #7”, and you’ll be entered!

RULES AND CAVEATS: (1) First and foremost, DO NOT SPAM. Spread the word, but you don’t need to post about STARGAZER multiple times/in places that aren’t appropriate/etc. (2) One entry per reader, to help with rule #1. (3) Although ideally you can choose any name you would like for the character in AFTERLIFE if you win, I reserve the right to veto any name that really wouldn’t fit into the world of the series. (No “Fifi Nutella” or any such thing.)

In the rush of getting ready for the big launch, I continue to be seriously behind on e-mails. Bear with me, everybody. And I hope you all enjoy STARGAZER.

For STARGAZER Contest #5, I asked you guys to send in your favorite movies made before 1960. I admit, I had no idea you all would have such incredibly good taste in films. This list is pretty impressive:

The Thin Man
Roman Holiday
Top Hat
The Maltese Falcon
North by Northwest
Sleeping Beauty
Rebel Without a Cause (Lori Ann even has a James Dean tattoo!)
Casablanca
Cat People
Pajama Game
Rebecca
Bride of Frankenstein
Some Like It Hot
The Wizard of Oz
Gone With the Wind
Rear Window
Charade
An Affair to Remember
Calamity Jane
Brides of Dracula
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
The King and I
Dracula
Frankenstein
A Night at the Opera
Citizen Kane
The Philadelphia Story
Penny Serenade
The African Queen
Singing in the Rain
Meet Me in St. Louis
Rope
The Searchers
A Summer Place
Giant
Bringing Up Baby
Splendor in the Grass

I think my favorite entry came from April, who wrote that her favorite pre-1960 movie was either “Psycho or Mary Poppins.”

We had five lucky winners this time: Congrats to Shellye N., who won the grand prize of all four DVDs, and to Rozy C., Janel M., Jennifer A. and Sara M., who won one DVD each!

But there’s one more week until STARGAZER hits stores, and that means we’ve got time for STARGAZER Contest #6!

I have now opened up a Zazzle store! Those of you who might be dying for an Evernight mousepad or T-shirt or whatever may now sate those cravings. Within a couple of days, we’ll have the store linked to the website.*

make custom gifts at Zazzle

To celebrate, I’ll be giving 10 winners one item of their choice from the Zazzle store. What do you have to do to enter? As long as this contest is beginning on St. Patrick’s Day, with four-leaf clovers everywhere, just tell me: What’s your lucky charm? (If you don’t believe in luck, you can just explain that too.) Send your answer to evernightclaudia at gmail dot com, with the subject line “STARGAZER Contest #6.” You don’t have to decide what you want unless/until you win, but be sure that your entry contains a valid e-mail address I can use to reach you.

* For the record, I’m not exactly planning on making tons of money this way; it’s mostly so I can get a mug for myself. I figured I’d offer you guys the option.

— to be really excited that STARGAZER has cracked the Amazon Top 1,000? It had been hovering just beneath that for a while now, but for this hour at least, it’s at #968, baby!

Okay, possibly this is quite silly. In any case, it is certainly time for bed.

(You still have a few hours to enter STARGAZER Contest #5, you know –)

ETA from silly person: Now it’s #946!

Sorry I’m so late getting this up, guys — things are wild. Can you believe it’s only two weeks until STARGAZER comes out?

So, for Contest #4, I asked all of you to tell me your strangest dreams, so it seems only fair that I share my strangest dream with you. Essentially, I was fighting against a zombie attack with Willow and Xander from “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and Regis Philbin. We were in a grocery store throwing toilet paper (full rolls) at the zombies, particularly the ones in fancy colors. (Lilac, I recall, had an especially powerful zombie-deterrent effect.) Well, one of the zombies shrunk Regis until he was less than a foot tall. The only way to restore Regis to his correct size was to run him over the checkout scanner. So I was trying to do this, but he’d gotten dishwashing liquid all over himself (clean up, aisle four) and was panicking — so he was incredibly slippery and wriggling around. It was very hard to hang onto him to run him across the scanner!

But my weird dreams? Are as nothing compared to YOUR weird dreams.

You guys have seen baby kangaroos hopping by your beds, found pirate ships trapped in your houses and spoken to talking purple cows. You have gone to black-and-white planets where there are mysterious rainbow trees, turned into Tarzan to escape grizzly bears and gotten punked by the entire cast of “Pirates of the Caribbean.” You have made friends with Hillary Duff when she walked into your bathroom, fought vampires with Clint Eastwood, seen a romantic reunion between dolls of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, looked down at thousands of green-and-orange fish that all had the faces of Keira Knightley, and listened to Winston Churchill and Tony Blair discuss how to get a large Victorian woman unstuck from a toilet. One unfortunate person even had the nightmarish vision of her entire school’s teaching faculty grinding all dirty on the dance floor at prom!

I could never pick the weirdest dream, but I did pick a winner: Congratulations to Cara S.! Sh chose the Marc Jacobs perfume and so will be Bianca-scented soon.

I’m tired of this only-one-winner business, aren’t you? Let’s do better with STARGAZER Contest #5!

This contest was inspired by a couple of readers who have written or commented to say that they checked out some old Cary Grant movies on Bianca’s recommendation and have really enjoyed them (and him). So those shall be our prizes this week. One (1) grand prize winner will win DVDs of four Cary Grant movies: “Suspicion,” which Bianca and Lucas see on their first date; “An Affair to Remember,” Bianca’s all-time favorite Cary Grant movie; “Notorious,” my all-time favorite Cary Grant movie; and “To Catch a Thief,” just because everybody in the world should see that movie. Four (4) more winners will win one DVD and can choose from any of the above — or, if you are a person of such exceptional taste that you already own all four, you can name any other Cary Grant film available on DVD, and it’s yours.

All you have to do: Tell me your favorite movie made before 1960!

Winners will be chosen at random. Enter by e-mailing me at evernightclaudia at gmail dot com, with the subject line “STARGAZER Contest #5.” I’ll pick the winners a week from today, on Tuesday, March 17. Be sure to include a way for me to contact you in your entry. If you’re in another country, be sure to tell me what region DVD I need to get to you. Good luck to everyone!

By the way, dhfreak is trying to get a pre-release read-along going at evernightseries. I TOTALLY FAILED at announcing this last week and am very sorry. But it’s not too late, if you’re willing to read more than a chapter of EVERNIGHT a day while leading up to the big release —

I am doing an interview tonight for a journalism student who is putting together a magazine pitch as part of her project — basically, she is envisioning a smarter, edgier magazine for teen girls. She wants to write about the vampire craze, how it connects to the Goth scene and the reasons people find it so fascinating, without shrugging it off as a pure fad the way so many mainstream publications do. I’m talking with her about EVERNIGHT, but she is looking to talk to more teen girls (particularly those who would consider themselves Goth, but not only) about this. Is anyone game?

If so, drop me an email at evernightclaudia at gmail dot com, and I’ll pass your email address on to her. (Put “Interview Volunteer” in your subject line.) Right now this is only for her school project, not for outside publication.

Still one day to enter STARGAZER Contest #4!

I don’t know how many regular readers of this LJ are following the current online discussions about racism in scifi and fantasy. (If you aren’t, magicnoire has a very good summary here.) I’ve been reading this with great interest, and sometimes sadness, at the recognition of how badly scifi and fantasy writers have often let down nonwhite readers, and how much pain this has caused, and how resistant some other people are to having this conversation.

What’s worst, for me, is my own recognition of how freakin’ white the EVERNIGHT series is. I think of myself as an anti-racist person, as somebody who is fairly aware and who tries to do the right thing, but the first time I sat down to write an original YA fantasy, the characters who poured out were mostly white. (There’s Patrice, Dana and Raquel — and more peripheral characters such as Mr. Yee and Eduardo — but as much as I love them all, none of them is truly at the center of the action. I hope to God they aren’t “sidekicks,” but I have to admit they’re closer to that than to being main characters.)

I did this without meaning to. I did it without racist intent. And in a more perfect world that had ample, realistic portrayals of people from all different races and backgrounds in its fiction, one book like this might therefore not matter. But when there’s a larger pattern being created — a pattern that pretends people of color never have their own adventures (within fiction), or that they aren’t out there reading and watching (beyond fiction) — each tile becomes part of the pattern. And I hate that my first series fits into it so well.

All I can do is promise that no other series I write will ever be a part of that pattern.

Writing more characters from different backgrounds than my own* will be a challenge, and no doubt I will find new ways to go wrong in future. But I’d rather go wrong while trying than by not trying. Meaning no harm isn’t enough; we have to work to do better.

*besides being vampires, obviously