I went for the walk, nearly froze my nose off. It was windy and snowing pretty heavily by the time I got home. For some reason, the recording was of the inside of my pocket.
I’m disappointed because I talked at length about a book that I’m reading. It’s gorgeous but the opening is so egregiously off-putting that I was ready to throw it across the room halfway thru the second chapter. I’ve had some extensive conversations about the book with the author and as a result I started it again…from the beginning of chapter two.
Aww. Yeah.
Contemporary fantasy that looks like it’s going to owe a lot to Steven Donaldson’s Thomas Covenant (but without the endless angst, I hope). It’s filled with fantasy reader in-jokes yet they never distract from the storytelling. The language is sumptuous.
The Whirlwind In The Thorn Tree by S.A. Hunt. It’s currently free on Amazon. If this sounds like something you might like, give it a try.
Just skip the first chapter.
Btw, I don’t know if this will be of any use or not, but I have a fair bit of experience with foreign rights contracts, both drafting and signing them (maybe 10 so far?). One thing I’ve noticed is that foreign agents do almost nothing as far as finding publishers for the book. With one exception, they’ve just sat there and waited for a publisher in that country to approach them. If the publisher really wants to sign your book, I would think that you are someone they could easily find and contact.
I was talking with Laura Resnick in the comments section of both the Passive Voice, and Kris Rusch’s blog, and apparently she has never had a good experience with US based foreign rights agents. She has always lost money or opportunities, IIRC.
Nearly all foriegn rights contracts I’ve seen have been very straight forward. Not particularly complicated, and generally easy to understand, with ten year time periods. I would say that I did get an addemum about a year ago that was completely evil(all rights, lowered ebook royalties, etc, and all very well disguised). This was from a small German publisher, and the wording made me think it was something they’d picked up from a US publisher. The only single advantage a foreign rights agent offers is that they should have a good idea of the going market rates, but I think that’s something you have probably enough experience to push for and see how far it can go.
I love my foreign rights agent. While it’s true the contracts are all very straightforeward and the foreign agent is acting on behalf of an existing publisher … those people were pestering me on a regular basis and it was – frankly – nothing I wanted to deal with. I shuffled most of them off but when one got really insistent over several months, I found an agent to deal with it.
It’s possible that I’ve lost opportunities or money but this is all “found money” to me because without the agent, I’d just be blowing these people off.
Sounds great, then. Just out of curiosity, what countries have been interested in your books? It’s always fun to get interest from places you never would have imagined. “Romania? Okay…” Fwiw, I was at 87% of Hermit by 2am last night. I really wanted to push on through but finally had to admit defeat!