If March comes in like a lion, it will go out like a lamb…
We’ve all heard that saying before, and right now on the east coast, March is certainly roaring into gear with high winds and storms, temperatures of high seventies one day and low forties the next. It’s a season of unexpected shifts and unpredictable changes, of sunny days followed by tornado warnings.
For Mercury Retrograde Press authors, it’s also been a time of great change and activity. Over the past month, we’ve added a new author, Danielle L. Parker (with a smashing 4-book deal); launched Barbara Friend Ish’s debut novel, Shadow of the Sun, attended conventions, and much more. Here’s an update from each of our authors in turn:
Edward Morris, as always, has some impressive achievements to report. He’s sold a novella, “Tekeli-Li!”; it will appear in the forthcoming anthology Over the Mountains of Madness. Working with Lou Antonelli, Ed also sold a chapbook of collaborative stories to Yard Dog Press; so look for Music For Four Hands to be coming out soon (and to be well-received, from what we’re hearing). Ed is also, in his own words, “learning the joys and terrors of running a writing workshop, and the beauty and abomination that can emerge.” Look for Ed to have another list of completed projects next month–because that’s just the way he rolls. Unstoppably.
Moving right along, Zachary Steele will be in New York City in April for the second year of Just Working On My Novel; this event will feature readings from Zach’s forthcoming novel, Flutter, along with readings by Emily St. John Mandel and Richard Nash. Zach is also returning as an April guest blogger on the Southern Authors Blog. He’s been discovering the joys of web video program Xtranormal, and has a series of seven videos up on his blog so far, with more to follow; and with his usual boundless energy, has started yet another blog, The Adventures of Ducky Thomas.
Larissa N. Niec has news of a different stripe: in January, she was appointed president of the Interstitial Arts Foundation, which she says was a “really exciting honor…The IAF is doing fabulous things to support artists of all kinds who push conventional boundaries in their work.” In addition, she has worked with Broad Universe to produce two podcasts of herself reading from her debut novel, Shorn. The first one, which related to the BroadPod January theme of “Faith and Fear”, may be found here. The second, for the March theme of “Women and Power”, will be up by the end of this week, and may be accessed through the same link. And finally, on the non-fiction side, there is Play in Clinical Practice, released in February through Guilford Press. Larissa says of her “day job”: “My work in the area of child development and treatment really stimulates my thoughts about the human capacity for both terrible cruelty and stunning resilience, which in turn feeds my fiction in a number of ways.”
Barbara Friend Ish will be appearing at two conferences in the U.S. Southeast this month: StellarCon, this weekend (March 4-6) in High Point, N.C., and MidSouthCon, March 25-27 in Memphis, TN. She’ll also be doing a guest post on the literary books blog Baby Got Books around mid-month; we’ll post the link when it’s available. “I feel like a juggler this month,” she says. “There’s so much exciting stuff going on in the office these days, but I love to take time away and hang out with other SFF lovers, so two cons in one month is a huge treat.”
Last but not least, Leona Wisoker’s much-anticipated sequel, Guardians of the Desert, is due out at the end of March. Her second book launch is shaping up to be even more fun than the first, and slightly more organized: the main party will be on April 2, at CoCo Chocolatier of Williamsburg, VA. A second launch party will be held within RavenCon the following weekend, and for any Virginia Beach locals who couldn’t attend either of those, a third book launch party will be held on the third weekend of April, at Cozy Corner of Virginia Beach. When her tunnel-vision on organizing those events widens to include the rest of the world, Leona has been steadily updating her own blog with the help of guest bloggers like Steven Savage of Fan to Pro, writing and editing more book and event reviews for Green Man Review and Sleeping Hedgehog, and teaching an intensive writing class once a week at Cozy Corner.
March has indeed blown in like a lion for all of us here at Mercury Retrograde Press; will it go out like a lamb? With this lineup, we seriously doubt it.
