News For The Cammy Crew

I've got some marginally philosophical things to talk about, but I'm saving them for later. Today it's just a Me-And-My-Editor report.

First off, the weather here didn't cooperate, so we were stuck indoors most of the time she was here.

Too bad, but better than the tsunami warnings she was faced with when she arrived in Hawaii! Sheez. She was looking forward to leaving New York City snow behind for a few days and wound up being rushed to higher ground for safety from flooding.

Anyway, back to her being here.

I have a "partner desk". I just love the thing. It's dark wood, with lovely carved detail, and drawers on both sides. It's really old, and not huge -- just right for me. And this week, it was just right for me and my editor. I just cleared a spot for her and she opened her laptop, and I opened mine, and we worked at the desk much longer than girls on vacation should.

So I read her some of the comments posted here. She laughed, and said Awwww, and was in general touched by the things that were posted. See, Nancy's the one who pulled me out of the slush pile. She's the one who went to her boss and said she believed in me and wanted to buy these books about a girl named Sammy from this unknown author. So she's been with me from the very beginning, and the comments made here by The Cammy Crew touch her they way they touch me.

Just so you know.

Now, usually we have the "Five Year Plan" conversation over the phone, but this time we got to have it in person. What this entails is determining when a book is to come out (what season, and what month in that season), and when the paperback will be released. Random House divides the calendar into three seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall. (There is no Winter in publishing, despite the fact that 2009 was a long cold spell for many publishers due to the economy, among other factors.) So "Spring" is the first 4 months of the year, Summer the next four, and Fall the final four.

The now-conventional wisdom is that Summer is a good time for paperbacks. But you want to have enough time available for the hardcover to sell. (In other words, they don't want to release a hardcover in Spring and the paperback in Summer...there just hasn't been enough time for the hardcover to sell.)

You also don't want to be in competition with yourself. In other words, have more than one of your own books on the same list. Which means (for an author that doesn't seem to know that it's okay to take a break) that scheduling can be a bit of a juggle.

Am I going into too much detail here?

Sorry. I just think the decision making parameters make it easier to understand the decision.

Regardless, what Nancy and I did was calendar out the Final Five Sammy Keyes books (plus the paperback of Wedding Crasher).

That's right -- it'll be over at Book 18.

I showed her my basic plot ideas for the remaining books, including when Sammy will find her dad, and what is going to happen in the last book.

We were both excited.

And a little sad.

Sammy has been part of our lives for so long and she's "real" to us. So the thought of driving toward the end is...bittersweet.

But how amazing is it that a person who got rejected by publishers for ten years is planning out the eighteenth book in a series?

Pretty darn amazing!

So on we go.

And here's what I now know about the near future:

• Random House is sending me on "blog tour" in May for the paperback release of Cold Hard Cash. This is a new way of "touring", and I'm all for it. I've been on traditional book tour many times and although I always enjoy meeting people at events, it's really quite exhausting (a different city every day) and expensive, and air travel is such a pain these days. Anyway, I've never done this before, but my understanding is that I'll be answering questions at a different blog every day during some week in May. I'll be sure to post the info as it becomes available.
• Random House liked the idea of a "Fan Page" on their website for me. The format is just rough at this point, but I'm encouraging them to include submissions that would range from comments to poems to art. It would be a great place for those of you who have artistic inclinations to post your Sammy-related (or Flipped-related, or Runaway-related...etc.) creations for the world to see.
• They want to have some Sammy mystery-related puzzle on-line. But when Nancy and I were brainstorming what the puzzle might be and what someone would get for solving the it, we couldn't really come up with anything that wouldn't incur prohibitive costs (like postage or prizes, etc.). And we sure didn't want it to be nothing. And then...
• Then I hit on the idea of posting chapters of a Sammy Short. Like a mini-book, available only to people who solved the puzzle. The story would be divided it into sections (probably 8), and every week you could go to the website, solve a puzzle, get an access code, and read the next chapter. All free to you, except for the investment of a little brain power. I really like this idea (if I do say so myself!) because I think it will make waiting for the October release of Wedding Crasher a lot more tolerable. Am I right?

So that's a brief overview of what's planned. I don't know where we are with the shoelaces or charm. They like the idea a lot, but if anything will materialize from it is unclear. I'll keep at it, though, and let you know.

Thanks for checking in--see you next Sunday!

Wendelin