Claudia Gray

Today I went to the doctor to get my travel vaccinations for my upcoming trip to South America. (Two weeks from today, I’ll be on my way to Chile and Argentina!) While the nurse was giving me the preliminary once-over, I remembered a scene in a doctor’s office in Hourglass (i.e, book three) and thought, I should double-check a couple of details while I’m at it. The nurse really got into it, I have to say! So when you guys read that bit, you’ll know where all the info came from. 🙂

Remember: You have until midnight EST Sunday night to enter the Immortal contest! Send me your favorite quote from Evernight, either via MySpace, my contact form on the claudiagray.com site or a comment at the post linked above, and you’ll be entered into the drawing. Three winners drawn at random will win autographed copies of the vampire romance anthology Immortal, which is sort of available at Borders stores.

This weekend I’m going hiking, and the brand-new digital camera is coming along for the ride so that I can get the hang of it before I head down South America way. Yes, it’s the return of the hike pics, next week! Stay tuned.

I have received many e-mails about this from fans in Spain, so I am happy to report that Stargazer will be released there in February 2009 — in other words, a whole month before it comes out in the United States. You guys will be good with the spoilers, right?

Right?

::crickets::

Also, it turns out that there’s a brand-new foreign rights sale — Mondadori has picked up the rights for Italy. No idea on release dates there or in Germany yet, but I’ll let you guys knows when I do.

And the website has been updated; if you’ve followed this LJ, you’re probably familiar with most of the new information, but you can get a first look at next summer’s anthology, Vacations From Hell.

Don’t forget — you still have a week and change to enter the contest to win a copy of Immortal!

I went to a party last night for the premiere of “True Blood.” Although this was not my most hotly anticipated new show of the year (that prize would go to “Fringe”), I was obviously interested. Vampires! Anna Paquin! What’s not to love? Then I read some iffy reviews and was less sure — but I still checked it out.

The next day, I’m still not quite sure what to think.

We can announce them at last!

The Pitch Black Tour, featuring me, Nancy Collins (Vamps) and Ellen Schreiber (Vampire Kisses) will be coming to:

Saturday, Oct. 25: 2 p.m. at Anderson’s Bookshop in NAPERVILLE, IL

Wednesday, Oct. 29: 6:30 p.m. at Borders in REDMOND, WA

There’s going to be a special website for the tour and everything — I’ll let everyone know as soon as that goes live (probably around the end of this month.) I can’t wait to meet you guys!

Meanwhile, don’t forget to enter the Immortal contest, to win your free autographed copy of Immortal: Love Stories With Bite.

The bad news: I still don’t have final, set-in-stone book tour stops to announce to you guys, but it should literally be any day now.

The good news: The wonderful Book Review Maniac has posted a great review of Evernight, and I did an interview with her too. So check those out!

Finally, it’s CONTEST TIME!

Although the vampire romance anthology Immortal is finally showing up in Borders and Waldenbooks stores around the country, it’s still not available online, and I know that not everybody lives in a region where Borders and Waldenbooks have much reach. So here’s what I am going to do:

To answer a few questions that might come up: (1) Yes, I’ll ship anywhere, even overseas. (2) I only have copies in English. (3) It will only be autographed by me — you’ll have to check out signings by the other fabulous authors if you want their John Hancocks as well. (4) You can enter by commenting on this post, on my MySpace page or through the “Contact Claudia” section of my website.

Good luck and have fun!

The Borders online store still seems to be convinced that Immortal: Love Stories With Bite doesn’t actually exist — but you might be able to find this in stores now. How do I know? I just got my copies in the mail! Yes, it’s a real book at last. I’ll update with another link if and when I can, and I think I’m going to hold a contest for a couple of copies, because obviously this is pretty hard to get. Anyway, I just wanted to keep you guys updated. Any contest announcements will come after Labor Day. Nobody can think the last week of August. It’s a rule.

We have confirmed one more date for the book tour this October, but I still can’t announce anything until all the dates are final. Stay tuned!

Had a fun hike this weekend, despite the fact that I fell rather spectacularly as we were going down a steep hill. My butt is now bruised in a hundred shades of Technicolor, and I am considering buying a pair of hiking poles, but I still had a great time. By the next hike, I’ll have a working digital camera again, so the hike pics will return.

And by the way, I don’t know if you all saw it in comments, but if you’d like to read the Juvenil Romantica interview in English, you can do so here. Thanks for posting, Eira!

Want to sign up at the Evernight fanlisting? Now you can, thanks to Mai!

Still no final tour details, but it shouldn’t be long now —

It’s been more than a week since my last update, mostly because I kept thinking I’d have big big news at any moment and I wanted to wait and put that in the next post. Well, I still don’t have all the details but I can at long last report: I’m going on tour the last week of October!

Not all the places are absolutely confirmed yet, so I’ll wait and list the full schedule at once. It’s not a huge trip (five cities at most), but they’re all over the country. The “Pitch Black” tour will feature two other awesome HarperTeen vampire authors, Ellen Schreiber and Nancy Collins. I’m incredibly psyched about this and hope to meet plenty of you on the road.

What all have I failed to blog about while waiting on the big news? Well, for one, I could’ve linked to this awesome interview at Juvenil Romantica. It’s in Spanish, though I am happy to reprint my answers in English here if y’all like. Beyond that, things have mostly been quiet, befitting the dog days of summer. How are you guys?

I’m this week’s blogger for the HarperTeen MySpace site — if you’d like to read my offering, you can check it out right here!

And although I now have some good questions for the interview with Bianca, I STILL need more and figure anytime during August is game. Ask away, people!

A longer trip update is coming, hopefully later today —

There are tons of places I’m fascinated by — Argentina! Canada! Japan! Spain! — but the first choice would have to be either Ireland or the United Kingdom. One of my very best friends lives in Northern Ireland, and were I to relocate to a whole other country, I know I’d want a good friend by my side.

By the way — I’m back from Mississippi! My new nephew Ari is indeed adorable, as is newly appointed Senior Nephew Eli, and I got to spend plenty of time with them and my whole family. I don’t have much time for a long post, because the Backspace writing conference is underway, and I’ve got a panel to moderate tomorrow that I, uh, might not have begun preparing yet. Some furious note-taking must occur. But I will check in soon with a longer travelogue.

I missed you guys!