Ghostblood is released!

My newest novella, Ghostblood, has now been released in electronic (e-book) format, and will soon be also available in print-on-demand (POD) format. The publisher, as it was already the case for North Star, is <a href=”http://www.calderwoodbooks.com”>Calderwood Books</a>. Here’s the blurb for the new book:

“In a land crushed by the weight of ages, the lives and deaths of two people – one running away from her fate, the other embracing his destiny – become intertwined. Both have a part to play in the history of their mummified empire, but as their destinies clash and the boundaries of death itself become blurred, can they even trust each other enough to fulfill their appointed fate?”

Ghostblood is set in the Twin Worlds, just like North Star, but it focuses on a different area and has no other connection to North Star. The scope is also somewhat different, and it’s not necessary to have read North Star to enjoy Ghostblood. For those who wonder when the events of the two books actually happen: North Star takes place roughly 86 years before Ghostblood.

Final Edits for Ghostblood

I just received the final version of Ghostblood, which I’m going to read in the next couple of days. If everything goes well (and I have no doubt it will), the book will finally be released after I send my approval to my editor Joy. Which means that Ghostblood should be available at Calderwood Books very soon.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank both Joy Calderwood (my tireless and enthusiastic main editor) and Jennifer Macaire (the skilled author of the covers for both Ghostblood and North Star, as well as reader and editor for both, Ghostblood in particular) for their help and insightful advice during the editing process. Neither book would be what it is today without their help, which is why I’m glad I chose them to publish both books

A Bit of News…

So it seems I haven’t posted anything since December… it’s a bit of a shame, although to my defense I should say in these past three months I had to complete my PhD and to move from my old apartment, so I’ve been relatively busy. Nevertheless, things have been moving forward, just so you know I haven’t exactly been idle, either. The editing of Ghostblood is finished, and we’re working on covers right now, so the largest part of the work there is done; Carnival is in its last stretch, after a few bumps in the road; Worldwalkers (now tentatively renamed Worldmakers) is pushing to be written, and there is yet another story, which I don’t really have a title for right now but for which a good working title would be Amyrean, is also trying to make itself heard.

As if this were not enough, Ghostblood as a novella is an introduction to a larger storyline, and that one too is preparing to make itself known. In the meantime, I’m also focusing my world-building efforts on the kingdoms and lands which that story will focus on, so I would say that it’s still a little bit off.

And yes, I know it seems that, with the exception of North Star, all my stories have one-word names… What can I say, I like how they sound. I also should mention that the larger storyline deriving from Ghostblood will probably include not just one, but more novel-length books, and a couple of names have already come to me, although I can’t be sure they’ll be the final ones.

Anyway, lots of stuff to do, so I’d better get back to it. As usual, I’d like to hear from you if you have questions or comments – not just about the blog, but also about my books, for those who have read them – so please do feel free to either comment on the blog or to send me an e-mail. Thanks!

Merry Christmas!

A merry Christmas and a happy new year to everyone! May this coming 2009 bring you all happiness, satisfaction and joy!

What is Coming Next…

First of all, I should apologize for not having updated the blog in a while… real life tends to have a habit of getting in the way, sometimes. Anyway, a few things happened since last time we spoke. First of all, for those of you who prefer a physical paper book to an e-book, North Star is now also available in paperback format through Lulu.com. The book looks very good, if I may say so myself!

Second, I just signed the contract, so Ghostblood is now officially starting the process which will lead it to be published by Calderwood Books as well. The main reason why I decided to do so is that I’ve begun working on its sequel, but for obvious reasons people who read the sequel might want to get to know the characters first, and in its previous incarnation, Ghostblood was available as a novella inside an anthology, which would have made it hard for people to find it if they did not know the title of the anthology. Hopefully, it will be received like North Star was.

And third, but no less important, Carnival is now getting to an end. Don’t get me wrong, there is still a bit to write – and then the editing and rewriting begins – but the majority of the story is done now, and I can say without a doubt that it’s unlike any other story I have written so far, both in terms of topics which it explores (darker, perhaps, than those of previous stories) and in terms of structure. The latter is an experiment – I wanted to write the stories of several characters which combine to form a larger storyline. However, I also wanted to show the differential contributions of the characters to the story, so that things which seem to be unexplained at first, are explained away much later.  Hopefully the narrative will be coherent and understandable, but we’ll see.

Anyway, as you can see, there’s much going on at the moment. A fourth story, tentatively called Worldwalkers, is also in the back of my mind, but it might have to wait until I fashion a structure for it. So keep your fingers crossed, and let’s see what 2009 has in store!

Merry Christmas, and a happy new year to everyone!

MyShelf Review

The people over at MyShelf.com have posted their review of North Star. I’m rather embarrassed due to the comparisons they have drawn, but all in all, I’m extremely excited at what they had to say. Here it is:

“Wow.

For days I have sat with only that word on the paper. Just “Wow.” I can’t come up with a way to describe North Star that doesn’t marginalize the story, the characters and the situations. Saying this is a story about a man who lost his wings and a centaur traveling beyond the boundaries of its world, to search for a lost people, would be like saying Beowulf is about a warrior who fights scary monsters, or that Don Quixote is about a crazy old man who rides around Spain and thinks he is a knight. North Star is so much more.

I was spellbound by the text, which is wrapped in a lyrical prose, which sings the grief, love, desire, joy, excitement and fear described by the tale-weaver from the first word. If you enjoy the early classics: The Canterbury Tales, The Song of Roland, The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnel, you will revel in Pacifici’s attention to style and storytelling.

If you do not normally read fantasy, North Star is a wonderful place to start. There is a link on this page that will take you to an excerpt. After you read those few carefully chosen words, you will not be able to rest until you have read the entire novel, and you will be hard pressed to find a finer exemplar of the genre in any age.”

-Beth E. MacKenzie for MyShelf Reviews (© MyShelf.com, 2008)

You can also read it at its original location here.

North Star wins an EPPIE Award!

It’s official: yesterday evening, at the EPICon gala in Portland, North Star was awarded the 2008 EPPIE award in the Fantasy category! The full announcement and list of winners can be found here.

I would like to thank several people who have ultimately made it possible, including my family, my friends, and my extraordinary editor, Joy Calderwood of Calderwood Books, who has been an invaluable source of advice when preparing North Star for publication, as well as being the person who originally submitted the book for the EPPIE awards. Thanks for believing in me!

The Others…

No, I’m not going to launch into a discussion about “Lost”. But recently I had a few ideas about stories I would like to write, and they led me to think about a strangeness I have noticed in the fantasy genre. By and large, the majority of fantasy writers have more than a single sentient race in their worlds. This makes sense: in the case of the Twin Worlds, for example, the existence of a large number of deities who directly interact with the world, the possibility of magical accidents, or the outcome of other events such as mass curses as the like, have led to a “speciation” where a small number of original races have, over time, become a large number of very diverse sapient races. So, at least in worlds where magic and/or deific intervention are contemplated, it makes sense for different sentient races to share the world. But have you noticed how, in most cases, fantasy novels are racially biased?

It makes sense, within the context of a novel, to use a human (or whatever is closest to humankind in your world) as a primary point-of-view character: it makes identifying with him (or her) easier for the reader, and gives the reader a frame of reference through which to look at the world, which otherwise might be strange and bewildering. However, more bizarre or exotic races usually take a back seat, and while members of them may become supporting characters, they almost never become the main characters in the story, or love interests. In fact, often when this happens, they eventually either die or are “removed” towards the end of the book.

One could object that the differences in mindset between different races are enough to prevent inter-racial mingling:
that would make sense, but only up to a point, and only if the setting contemplates this. In the Twin Worlds, the fact that many races descend from a single one means that they very likely still have similar mindsets and ways of relating to the world around them: of course, differences may exist, but they are in no way a barrier.

Several ideas I have come up with involve members of the less common and more exotic races of the Twin Worlds; it is a good chance, I think, to explore what these races go through and how other people may relate to them. Racism is as much an evil in fantasy worlds as it is in the real world: this, too, is a topic that can be explored through these tales.

2008 EPPIE finalist!

A while ago, my publisher submitted North Star for the Epic awards (also known as EPPIEs). These awards are given out yearly for excellence in writing and e-publishing, being reserved only for e-books.

Well, today I just heard from my publisher that North Star is among the finalists in the fantasy category! Winners will be announced at the beginning of March in Portland, so let’s keep fingers crossed… This is already a great result, especially since North Star is my first professionally published novel!

EDIT: I also just received the official announcement e-mail by Epic Awards… as I understand it, the full list of finalists will be released next week or so.

North Star Poetry

I know I haven’t been very active for the past couple of months, but sometimes real life has a habit of intruding upon the most carefully laid plans. Nevertheless I have had a chance to dig in my old notes for North Star and the general notes about the Twin Worlds – the setting of the book, as well as almost all the other stories I have written. Among all sorts of notes – descriptions of the Worm That Walks (a creature loosely inspired by a Lovecraft story, the main nemesis of the Twin Worlds with its insane and alien schemes) and of the kingdoms of Ibrin and Azran, notes on cultures and even on proverbs, I have found an old poem I wrote regarding the North Star of the Twin Worlds – the same star the book takes its name from. Although the poem didn’t end up in the finished version of the book, originally it was intended to be at the beginning, where the quote from “The Star of Fulfilled Dreams” now stands. Eventually I decided to remove the poem and place a quote from a fictional book because I had already used another poem for my previous story, Ghostblood, and I didn’t want to copy the structure of that story. But I also removed it because the quote was much better at explaining the nuances of the North Star and how it could fulfill wishes. And finally, I removed it because it felt a bit forced – at the time, I was exploring rhyming, and the poem was built with rhyming in mind; that part works, but trying to force it into shape always gave me the impression that it sounded contrived and a bit lifeless.

The reason why I decided to post it anyway is to show that sometimes things change a great deal between the first draft of a story and the final version. Looking back, I’m quite glad I didn’t include this poem, for reasons you’ll likely instantly notice once you read it: I’d like to consider this a lesson in humility, to show a mistake to the world at large. But at least we can learn from mistakes, can we not? So, here goes:

The North Star

Ablaze in the sky, sparkling bright,

North Star of legend, omen of light;

Lead all dreamers along thy way,

And let not one be gone astray.

 

Spark of hope and dreams unbound

By those who sought and nothing found,

Light the way to heart’s desire

That all who seek in truth require.

 

And past thy light, nothing is gone,

For wish fulfill’d and light o’ dawn,

And all thy merry, sparkling light

Kindles the soul to great delight.