And then I got very busy.
And that means there’s a lot backed up here.
So I’m just gonna spray it.
My new book, SLEEPLESS, is coming out tomorrow. In the manner typical of significant personal events, this has both taken for-fucking-ever, and totally snuck up on me out or fucking nowhere.
Writing SLEEPLESS was a tough sonofabitch. I am deeply invested in it.
Many of my readers are going to flat out hate this fucking book.
Period.
Fucking period.
Some people who want nothing to do with anything else I have ever written are going to like this book.
Fucking period again.
And that’s a little intimidating and scary. I don’t have a plan to change forever the kind of books I write, but this one is different enough to just not work for some of my regulars.
Sorry.
Anyway, it comes out tomorrow. I’m gonna try and get back here and do some whoring. But I’m still very busy with other stuff. So you may be spared the whore.
Not unrelated to SLEEPLESS, I’m going on a little tour.
Here are the places and dates:
Tuesday, January 12
7:00pm
The Poisoned Pen
4014 N Goldwater Blvd. Suite 101
Scottsdale, AZ 85251
(with T. Jefferson Parker)
Wednesday, January 20
7:00pm
BookPeople
603 North Lamar Blvd.
Austin, TX 78703
Thursday, January 21
7:00pm
Legacy Books
7300 Dallas Pkwy Ste A120
Dallas, TX 75024
Friday, January 22
6:30pm
Murder by the Book
2342 Bissonnet St.
Houston, TX 77005
Saturday, January 23
2:00 PM
Mysterious Galaxy
7051 Clairemont Mesa Blvd. Suite #302
San Diego, CA 92111
Saturday, January 30
2:00pm
Mysteries to Die For
2940 Thousand Oaks Blvd.
Thousand Oaks, CA 91362
4:00pm
Mystery Bookstore
1035 Broxton Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90024
Sunday, January 31
Dark Delicacies
4213 West Burbank Blvd.
Burbank, CA 91505
Hope to see you.
Oh, and THE MYSTIC ARTS OF ERASING ALL SIGNS OF DEATH came out in trade paperback last week.
It’s still a book you have to pay for, but it’s cheaper than a hardback.
The library is good, too.
Marilyn Stasio at the NY Times put it on her notable books of 2009 list HERE.
And then it got a little more love from the NY Times Paperback Row feature HERE.
One of the projects that’s been keeping me so busy is the development of a TV show based on MYSTIC ARTS for HBO.
What happened was that I was lucky enough to make an acquaintance with Alan Ball a couple years back and we’d spoken about doing a film or TV project about.
More recently I asked him if he was interested in the idea of a MYSTIC ARTS TV show and he volunteered to executive produce and guru for my first foray into TV.
Hint to the TV newbie: having Alan Ball as your guru helps.
Sometimes, you just get unreasonable lucky.
Anyway, I’m writing the pilot. If it clears the many many hurdles in between script and TV show, the first season will loosely follow the plot of the book.
And then who the fuck knows what.
My DEATHLOK miniseries for Marvel has been running for a couple months now. I think issue three is due this month. It’s pretty wild and over the top. Crazy SF adventure noir. Skull faced cyborg warrior takes on the world.
The last Joe Pitt book, MY DEAD BODY, has seemed to please a few people. And I’d like to thank the people who thought is sucked for not emailing me. It’s nice to keep that bubble unburst.
There is some pending movie news regarding CAUGHT STEALING, but the producers have yet to announce the deal so I need to keep it under my hat for now.
I’m still not working on my next novel, which seems more than weird. There’s this idea that’s still building for me, and it’s nice to have other work that’s kind of subsidizing the development of the idea. But I’m getting antsy. Also, most of my work over the last several months has had at least some socially interactive component, and I’m eager to be a selfish motherfucker again and god of my own world.
For the last few weeks I’ve been neck deep in a second TV project with a writing partner. This is another deal where the powers that by have yet to spill the beans, so I can’t share details as yet. About all I can say is that it’s my partner’s idea, it’s a cop show, and we’ll know soon if the pilot will be made.
I finished all the scripts for my 12 issue run on one of Marvel’s cadillac titles, but (wait for it) they haven’t announced the details yet so…
I do know it should start running in fall of this year.
I’m not sure when the smoke is going to clear so that I can compose some actual thoughts about writing, but it is what it is what it is.
With SLEEPLESS coming out you can be pretty sure that I’ll at least be running news in that quarter.
Speaking of which, here’s the starred review that ran in KIRKUS a few weeks back (A few SPOILERS in here):
“Thirty million Americans are sleepless, and it’s killing them.
What began modestly and unobtrusively is now a pandemic—ten percent of the world’s population can’t sleep. Ever. Zombie-like, the sleepless roam nocturnal streets, desperate to fill endless hours, while their bodies—and minds—disintegrate. This disease is a death sentence, usually within a year. While there’s no known cure, symptoms can be alleviated, but only by an increasingly hard-to-get drug named Dreamer. Parker Haas, a young police officer, seems immune to the disease, but his wife Rose is dying of it. Months ago, she passed the stage where she could care for their child in the loving way she used to. Instead, she spends her diminishing time obsessively immersed in Chasm Tide, a complex doomsday video game. On the street one day, Park learns of a possible source for Dreamer, which has become central to a flourishing black market. Then he discovers a conspiracy to artificially control the Dreamer supply in order to protect an exorbitant profit margin. The world may in fact be coming to an end as so many around him insist, but Park keeps it simple. He has never seen any path but the one straight ahead, and the imperative remains what it always was. If there’s a conspiracy, his job is to investigate it. If a perpetrator, no matter how powerful, can be identified, his job is to jail the guy. A good cop does what a good cop has to do. For Park, the rest is abstraction.
A writer as skilled as Huston (The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death, 2009, etc.) can make an apocalyptic story terrifyingly plausible. Readers prone to depression should approach with care.”
See you out there.
-c