キャミー・タング著「戌年」連載小説 プロのドッグトレーナーであるマリ・ムトウは、厄年を迎えている。 犬小屋と訓練所の改築をしながら、いつも不服そうにしている家族と同居することになった。母と姉に言わせれば、犬の毛とよだれかけにまみれる仕事は、家族にとって恥ずべきものだという。彼女は元カレを説得し、数ヶ月間犬を預かってもらうことにした。しかし、彼の兄は、数週間前に彼女が誤って車に追突した、怒り狂ったセキュリティ専門家であることが判明する。 アシュウィン・ケイトウは十分な問題を抱えている。叔母が玄関先に現れ、同居を希望している。彼は彼女にすべてを借りているので、断ることができません。母親が家を出て行った後、ネルおばさんはアシュウィンと弟を引き取り、愛のあるキリスト教の家庭で育てた。しかも、弟のダスティもアパートを追い出され、居場所を求めている。しかし、彼は犬を飼っている。そして、その犬の飼い主は誰だと思いますか？ しかし、旧友でオアフ島のノースショアでデイスパを経営する私立探偵のエディサ・ゲレロから依頼を受ける。マリの施設で奇妙な破壊行為があり、3年前に失踪したエディサの妹の財布を発見する。エディサはマリが危険な目に遭っているのではと心配する。警備の専門家であるアシュウィンがすでにマリを知っていることを知ったエディサは、忙しい若い女性を密かに監視することを彼に依頼する。 アシュウィンは、活発でのんびりとしたドッグトレーナーに不本意ながら惹かれていく。彼女は、幸せそうな母親を思い出させる。その母親の裏切りによって、彼は人と距離を置くようになったのだ。マリは、アシュウィンの冷たい外見を見抜き、彼が家族に忠実な男であることを認める。彼は、彼女のキャリア選択を批判するだけの母親や姉とは違う。 マリのバラバラな家庭とアシュウィンのバラバラな家庭の中で、過去を隠そうとする人たちから、彼らの周りに危険が迫ってくるようになる。彼らは、影で動く秘密に光を当てることができるのか？ 過去に発表されたパートへのリンクはこちら。 *** 第8章 - 恐ろしくも真っ白な不動産書類 『みんな仲良くできないのかな？』 マリは無用に力を込めて箱に本を投げ入れた。最近、なぜ彼女は人生の中で全員と言い争いをしているのだろう？もしかすると、これは本当に悪いアイデア
Captain’s Log, Stardate 04.25.2006
Blog book giveaway:
My Thursday book giveaway is A BABY FOR DRY CREEK by Janet Tronstad.
My Monday book giveaway is THE REMEDY FOR REGRET and A WINDOW TO THE WORLD by Susan Meissner.
You can still enter both giveaways. Just post a comment on each of those blog posts. On Thursday, I'll draw the winner for A BABY FOR DRY CREEK and post the title for another book I'm giving away. Stay tuned.
Continued from Mount Hermon recap, part 6:
Pray for Jeff Dunn (RiverOak). He had gall bladder surgery and couldn’t make it to the conference.
This is for all you writers. I’m afraid I was remiss in taking better notes at the editors’ panel, but the questions some of the attendees asked weren’t very interesting to me, either. So I popped up with a question: “Are there any secrets you (the editors) could give away about trends of the market genres?”
Andy McGuire (Moody) thinks readers will start to demand more straight mystery series (like Sue Grafton’s alphabet series) with a detective or PI to follow through a dozen books or so.
Zondervan is not interested in speculative fiction/sci-fi/fantasy AT ALL. And in case you missed it the first time, that means NONE. Karen Ball was very frank—the sales numbers just don’t support the risk of publishing in that genre.
Jeff Gerke (NavPress) gave a terrific theory about the future of speculative fiction/sci-fi/fantasy (SF/F). He thinks that in 3-5 years, one spectacular SF/F book will explode into the market (kind of like Left Behind but in SF/F), and then the publishing houses will start requesting SF/F manuscripts like crazy. Jeff’s friend Dave Long (Bethany House) disagrees, but let’s hope Jeff is correct. Otherwise, all the Christians who love sci-fi/fantasy will continue to go to Barnes and Noble and buy the secular stuff.
The editors were a bit slap-happy by this time in the conference, so they bantered around and put down poor Jeff, and didn’t answer my question any further.
Because they were bought by Hachette Livre, Warner Faith will be changing their name to something like Hachette Publishing Group?, I didn’t take good notes. Chip MacGregor mentioned when that was happening but I don’t remember.
Karen Ball is leaving Zondervan on the 28th? I think? but will be editing for them as a freelancer. I think she’ll be my editor! Yay!
Tomorrow: How I came to be murdered.
TMI:
Discussion loop: On this loop I belong to, someone asked about houses buying on proposal, especially since the author had a couple books published a few years ago, but her current proposal had been turned down by her publisher. I answered on-loop and thought I was being very logical and friendly, saying that most houses (from my experience and talking with other published authors) usually don’t buy a manuscript on proposal from someone they’ve never published before (unless, of course, you’re someone like Jennifer Weiner or Amy Tan).
So a day later I went back and others on the loop have disagreed with me, that houses do buy on proposal from previously published authors, even if that author hadn’t published with that particular house before. (I really don’t buy that. Not unless the author had great sales at the other publishing house.)
So I read my response again, and Oh my gosh can someone please remove the poker from my butt??? How do I come across as so asinine on e-mail?
I will no longer be the first to respond to an email. I will instead gauge the atmosphere and if people are persisting in fairy-tale delusions about houses having $100,000 to throw away on every manuscript that crosses their desk, so be it. I will just keep my mouth shut.
Blog book giveaway:
My Thursday book giveaway is A BABY FOR DRY CREEK by Janet Tronstad.
My Monday book giveaway is THE REMEDY FOR REGRET and A WINDOW TO THE WORLD by Susan Meissner.
You can still enter both giveaways. Just post a comment on each of those blog posts. On Thursday, I'll draw the winner for A BABY FOR DRY CREEK and post the title for another book I'm giving away. Stay tuned.
Continued from Mount Hermon recap, part 6:
Pray for Jeff Dunn (RiverOak). He had gall bladder surgery and couldn’t make it to the conference.
This is for all you writers. I’m afraid I was remiss in taking better notes at the editors’ panel, but the questions some of the attendees asked weren’t very interesting to me, either. So I popped up with a question: “Are there any secrets you (the editors) could give away about trends of the market genres?”
Andy McGuire (Moody) thinks readers will start to demand more straight mystery series (like Sue Grafton’s alphabet series) with a detective or PI to follow through a dozen books or so.
Zondervan is not interested in speculative fiction/sci-fi/fantasy AT ALL. And in case you missed it the first time, that means NONE. Karen Ball was very frank—the sales numbers just don’t support the risk of publishing in that genre.
Jeff Gerke (NavPress) gave a terrific theory about the future of speculative fiction/sci-fi/fantasy (SF/F). He thinks that in 3-5 years, one spectacular SF/F book will explode into the market (kind of like Left Behind but in SF/F), and then the publishing houses will start requesting SF/F manuscripts like crazy. Jeff’s friend Dave Long (Bethany House) disagrees, but let’s hope Jeff is correct. Otherwise, all the Christians who love sci-fi/fantasy will continue to go to Barnes and Noble and buy the secular stuff.
The editors were a bit slap-happy by this time in the conference, so they bantered around and put down poor Jeff, and didn’t answer my question any further.
Because they were bought by Hachette Livre, Warner Faith will be changing their name to something like Hachette Publishing Group?, I didn’t take good notes. Chip MacGregor mentioned when that was happening but I don’t remember.
Karen Ball is leaving Zondervan on the 28th? I think? but will be editing for them as a freelancer. I think she’ll be my editor! Yay!
Tomorrow: How I came to be murdered.
TMI:
Discussion loop: On this loop I belong to, someone asked about houses buying on proposal, especially since the author had a couple books published a few years ago, but her current proposal had been turned down by her publisher. I answered on-loop and thought I was being very logical and friendly, saying that most houses (from my experience and talking with other published authors) usually don’t buy a manuscript on proposal from someone they’ve never published before (unless, of course, you’re someone like Jennifer Weiner or Amy Tan).
So a day later I went back and others on the loop have disagreed with me, that houses do buy on proposal from previously published authors, even if that author hadn’t published with that particular house before. (I really don’t buy that. Not unless the author had great sales at the other publishing house.)
So I read my response again, and Oh my gosh can someone please remove the poker from my butt??? How do I come across as so asinine on e-mail?
I will no longer be the first to respond to an email. I will instead gauge the atmosphere and if people are persisting in fairy-tale delusions about houses having $100,000 to throw away on every manuscript that crosses their desk, so be it. I will just keep my mouth shut.
Comments
I knew you when...
But I guess they won't care since they have your brilliance, Camy.
Thanks for all the reports.
Always a joy to read your blog, even if it is all pink and stuff. :)
But I understand what you said on the commenting section. You said "most" and I agree with you. "Most" houses don't. Some might. Some do. I think anytime people use the words "always" and "never" there's an acception. Sheesh, I think people just split hairs sometimes. LOL. Sleep easy. You were right too. :)
But I will hope for that breakout novel that opens doors to come this year, not in 3-5. Oh, yeah. And I hope it's one that makes me sing with reader-delight! Me like books make Mir slappy-happy.
Mir<---not yet slappy happy about CBA SF/F