Announcing the latest Star Trek writer: me!

I'm very happy to announce that I have been contracted to write a Star Trek novel! Those of you who know me well will probably know I've been a fan of Trek for a long, long time.

What few people realize is that one of my first attempts to become a published author, way back in the day, was by sending in a proposal for a Star Trek: The Next Generation novel. I was in grad school at Tennessee at the time, and I had an idea to do a Heart of Darkness/Star Trek mash-up with Worf playing the role of Marlow, going after a rogue Kurtz-like Vulcan on a pre-warp planet. (If that explanation makes sense to you, kudos on multiple levels.)

The funny thing about the whole process was that Pocket Books, the publishers of Star Trek novels, only allowed agented submissions--and no agent was interested in someone who was offering to just write licensed fiction. So Wendi submitted my work under her maiden name as my literary agent--with phony letterhead and all.

Alas, while Pocket Books liked my work (particularly the humor) I had mixed the Next Generation show with the Deep Space Nine show in the book (Worf made a pit stop at DS9 on the way to the assignment--this was before his character migrated to that show!) and that was apparently a no-no. I would have been happy to take that part out, but it was a no from Pocket, and I had already moved on to other writing projects and dreams anyway. My writing career went a very different direction, as you know, but I continued to read Star Trek novels as a fan, and often still daydreamed about writing a Star Trek novel.

Then, at the end of last year, Simon & Schuster began a new young adult Star Trek series called Starfleet Academy. The series is based on the academy days of Kirk, McCoy, Uhura, and Spock, as re-imagined in the fabulous Star Trek reboot that came out in theaters in 2009. Star Trek? YA? I shot off an e-mail to agent Barry right away and asked him to look into it for me. He made first contact, I submitted a proposal, CBS/Paramount gave me their seal of approval--and I was contracted to boldly go where I've never gone before! My proposal is called Starfleet Academy: The Assassination Game, and given the quick turnarounds on the deadlines, it may even come out this year! (Part of the reason I've been so quiet around here lately is that I've had my nose to the keyboard on this and the other book I'm working on.)

I'll continue to write original books of course--in fact, now that I've turned in my outline for the Starfleet Academy book, it's back to the current work-in-progress, The League of Seven, which is almost finished. But writing for Trek is a long-time dream come true, and I'm thrilled to now be an official part of the Star Trek galaxy.

Live long and prosper!

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Neil Gaiman on book piracy

Neil Gaiman's thoughts on book piracy. Thoughtful, honest, and insightful!

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Silly Jo

Jo was in a super silly mood yesterday when she helped me photograph these Huggable Blockheads. I got silly pictures, pretend-sleeping pictures, lots (and lots) of pictures with her tongue sticking out, and a bunch of blurry shots because she was moving around so much. It took about ten times as long as it should have - and I loved every minute of it.

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Happy Valentine's Day!

Jo saw me working on some little stitched girls for this Friday's pattern over on my Shiny Happy World. She decided that this girl was her favorite so I surprised her by stitching it up as a little felt pin. Easy peasy - and it's so much fun to embroider on felt. I need to do it more often.

Happy day!

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RIP Brian Jacques

It was with great sadness that I read the news today that Brian Jacques has passed away from a heart attack at the age of 71. Jacques is the author of twenty-one novels set in the world of Redwall, a fantasy world where woodland animals live and fight like they're in The Adventures of Robin Hood. The books are unpretentious yet poetic, and highly literary yet action-packed.

I was thrilled and honored to have Mr. Jacques be the first person to agree to let me use his characters and his world in Fantasy Baseball, the book I've got coming out in March that has characters from classic children's books all living in the same fantasy world. He didn't ask for a dime; his only request was that I send him a signed copy when the book came out. I'll still send the book along to his family, of course, but it breaks my heart that I wasn't able to send it to him personally with my thanks before he was gone.

Watching him from afar, Brian Jacques seemed to have a real passion for life. Deaths like his are the hardest to take, I think, because he seemed to be someone who was really living, someone for whom life was a gift, both to be enjoyed and to be "regifted."

Farewell, Brian Jacques. I raise a strawberry cordial in your memory!

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