Here at The Publishing Spot, we won't judge you by your books. You can read whatever you want--from pulp fiction to deconstructed literary fiction to comic books--and we won't make fun of you.
I will alert you to situations where somebody might be judging your bookshelf. Jeff Bercovici (one of my favorite writing-world reporters right now) reminded me of a couple New York Times articles that you must read.
Don't let your next literary date sneak attack in the bookshelf battles. Save the college-epiphany books for the first-year anniversary:
"Judy Heiblum, a literary agent at Sterling Lord Literistic, shudders at the memory of some attempted date-talk about Robert Pirsig’s 1974 cult classic 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,' beloved of searching young men. 'When a guy tells me it changed his life, I wish he’d saved us both the embarrassment,' Heiblum said, adding that 'life-changing experiences' are a 'tedious conversational topic at best.'"
I won't judge, and neither will our special guest journalist Jeff Gordinier (check out our interview about interviewing).
What's more, if you are looking for some free entertainment this evening, he's reading at the Tribecca Barnes and Noble at 7 p.m.--feel free to discuss any pop culture book you want with his fans.
“Acey! It’s me Cici! Can you hear me?”
“Priority com signal detected. Activating secure channel.“
“There’s so many buttons on this thing. I should ask Talitha how it works.”
“Acknowledging priority communications. Stand by landing party.”
“Z-bot is that you?”
“Affirmative.”
“Yay! Is Acey home?”
“Negative. Commander Acey is currently piloting the Hana in a low orbit bearing 210 mark 76 at a range of 181 nautical miles.”
“Umm.. okay. Can I talk to her?”
“Affirmative. Stand by landing party.”
“Okay Z-bot! Over and out!”
“Z-bot to Hana.”
“Hana, Acey here.”
“Landing party is standing by on secure com channel, Commander. Patching.”
“Cici! Is everything okay?”
“Yeah! Teko left us a clue and now we’re looking for more pink flowers!”
“That’s good, Cici. Those flowers could be anywhere on the site. Teko moves very fast and he’s very smart.”
“Okay Acey! Can Talitha use my radio thingy too?”
“Sure. I’ll tell Z-bot to relay all signals from your com unit.”
“Yay! Thanks Acey! You’re the best!”
“Go get ‘em landing party. Hana out.”
And it shall come to pass
that a gentle voice shall be heard
in the Golden Wood
Telling tales of wonder
and guarded by the Living Forest
“Let’s hear it for the PROFESSOR!”
“Woohoo!”
“It’s Talitha-chan! And she’s got some of the bestest powers of all. Her treasure is the Goldenwood Shield, which is the only treasure that we got that’s actually alive just like a real tree!”
“In Palace in the Sky, Hayashi fought that demon in the Venom Deeps that was casting fire spells at us.”
“But the Warrior of the Forest can call on plants and trees to fight for her and she zapped those baddies for us. Tough fight.”
“I think she’s going to get some new powers in Call of the Huntress too, and one of them is called ‘Autumn Canopy.’”
“Ooh, that’s a pretty name. I wonder what it does?”
“So go check out Forest Girl’s page and get all attuned with flowers and gardens and all that good stuff. Say a few words, Professor.”
“She’s real shy and stuff, but Talitha-chan is our best friend and we’re glad she’s a warrior just like us! Ja ne minna-san!”
LadyStar™ Call of the Huntress is Copyright © 2007 Heavy Cat Multimedia Ltd. All Rights Reserved
Shannon looked around. Some of the plants had grown rather close to the water on the opposite side of the narrow brook. One of the plants looked odd and Shannon couldn’t quite figure out why. She continued looking at it, trying to sort the leaves from the branches. It was a very dense plant, and the leaves were larger than most of the other plants, so it was hard to tell which leaf was which.
What she noticed, however, was the long light brown strings that seemed to run around and around the branches. It looked almost as if they were hanging there. Then Shannon realized they were. She stood up and stepped over the shallow water to get a closer look. Strung through the outer edge of the shrub’s branches were two long light brown cords that looked very much like they were made of the same kind of leather as her scabbard. Shannon picked them up. The two pieces were about the width of a shoelace, but at least twice as thick.
I wonder where these could have come from? Shannon thought. She looked back and forth, wondering if someone had perhaps dropped them or they snagged the plant as they passed. Then Shannon started scouting along the ground around the banks of the nearby brook, thinking perhaps whomever had lost these cords had perhaps dropped other items. After a few moments, however, Shannon had found nothing, so she carried them back to where she had been sitting.
As she sat examining the two laces, she glanced at the scabbard she had set down by the edge of the water. She picked it up and took a closer look at it. Sure enough, the scabbard and laces seemed to be made of almost exactly the same material. I knew it, Shannon thought. Maybe the scabbard and laces went together somehow?
Shannon examined the scabbard closely. There were twin sets of two notches cut into one side of the flat leather, but they were far too small to thread the laces through. Shannon exhaled impatiently and dropped her hands to her lap, still holding the laces and scabbard. What are these for? Why don’t they go together?
“You are going to be in such trouble when the farmer finds out you raided his apples,” a voice said from behind Shannon. She quickly turned to look. A boy about her age was leaning against one of the ash trees near the brook, staring off in another direction. He was dressed in ragged canvas pants and a dingy-looking light-colored long-sleeve shirt. He was tossing a small dark-colored coin of some kind with one hand. He turned his head to look at her and raised an eyebrow.
“Shouldn’t you be about your chores, princess?” he said with a smirk.
Shannon sat agape. At least a dozen different emotions collided in her mind, shouting for attention. The majority were various degrees of annoyance, anger, frustration, embarassment and apprehension. About all Shannon could manage was one sputtering response.
“I’m not a princess!”
“Whatever you say,” the boy replied, turning back to staring into the forest. His shock of brown hair was combed only in the most liberal sense of the word. Not that it seemed to concern him in the slightest.
“I could put in a good word for you with the farmer, but I’ll have to ask for a favor, you know,” he said.
“Why you..” Shannon got to her feet and clenched her fists. The boy turned and put his hands out to try and calm Shannon down.
“Hey, hey, don’t mean no harm, princess. I’m just on the lookout for a few coins so I can buy my breakfast all honest-like. Don’t want the merchants to think I’m a shady type.”
“Do I look like I have any coins? Why would I be picking apples if I had coins to buy them with you stupid, raggedy-looking doofus! And if I did have any coins the last person I’d give them to would be you. And stop calling me princess. I’m a high school student and I’m a squad leader in band!” Shannon almost shouted.
“And you’ve got a bit of a temper, haven’t you?” the boy winked. Shannon frowned, mouth open. She was rapidly becoming too angry for speech. She clenched her eyes shut.
“Ooooh!” she exclaimed in a frustrated tone, then whirled around and plopped back down on her spot by the brook.
The boy observed Shannon sitting with her back turned for a few moments, then put his hands in his pockets and sauntered over near where she was sitting.
“Where’d ya get that knife?” he asked.
“I found it,” Shannon snapped, then folded her arms with emphasis.
“Bet it’d sell for a tidy sum,” he persisted.
“It’s not for sale,” Shannon replied. “It’s mine.”
“Well, you said you found it. Could belong to someone else,” the boy said, rocking back and forth on his heels and looking out over the water.
“They don’t want to sell it either,” Shannon said. The boy chuckled.
“How do you know they don’t want to sell it?” he asked with an amused tone.
“Because I just do,” Shannon frowned stubbornly.
“Do you always get what you want?” the boy asked.
“Yes,” Shannon said with a note of finality.
“And you say you’re not a princess,” the boy teased. Shannon looked up with an astonished expression. The boy’s blue eyes made him look curious about her more than anything else.
“Ran away from home myself last harvest.” He smiled and nodded his head in an upstream direction. “There’s an abandoned barn on the opposite side of that stand of maple if the night breeze gets too cold for you. Watch out for the farmer though. He’s a mean one.”
The boy picked his way down the bank towards a large rock in the stream, then expertly hopped across to the opposite bank. Moments later he disappeared into the trees again.
Shannon sat with an expression of total incredulity on her face. Just who did he think he was?
“You know, one thing a lot of new people might not know about our site is we are publishing our whole story for free so anyone can read it.”
“Yeah, we got two whole novels published already. One is called The Dreamspeaker, which is the story of when we found the first five Ajan Treasures. We also got The Palace in the Sky which is a story about when we went to a place called the Venom Deeps and battled lots of scary monsters.”
“Both of those books are already complete, and we have parts of two more books published. One is called Call of the Huntress which is going to be published next, and the fourth book is called Winterdancer. Both of those books will be published free just like the first two really soon.”
“So come back and visit us and be sure to read our books, ’cause we have lots of neat adventures. Ja ne minna!”
