Fiona is my Australian editor for the Wilderness books and also for Tied to the Tracks.
Some time ago somebody asked (and I don’t think I ever answered) why TTTT is coming out under the Sara Donati in Aus/NZ, and Rosina Lippi on the flip side. It’s simple. Sara Donati is a best selling author in that market. I’m not sure why, but the Kiwis and Aussies really, really love the Wilderness series. Of course Australia is also the place that nurtured and housed Farscape, so I’m not surprised at their communal good taste (she said modestly), but I’ve never been quite clear on it, either.
Rosina Lippi — that name isn’t familiar to the Sara Donati readers down undah, thus the name switch.
And now back to Fiona, the fabulous. An email from her today:
(we need to to make doubly sure our author knows the book will now be released here in August, not July(as a result of us rethinking the cover, but was obviously worth it) so she can holler about that on her website as we’re doing the same.
This is me hollering: Did y’all get that? TTTT in August for you. Fiona also tells me that their marketing people do not like the US cover for Queen of Swords and she has to come up with something else. She didn’t know what they don’t like about it, but they were adamant. Which makes me sad. Finally a cover I really love and it’s being rejected. Now I have to think up some alternate ideas to suggest. And you know what? I don’t have any idea.
You've stumbled across my official website and landed on the front page of my weblog.
I’ll be in the US for the RWA conference so I can get it there in July :-). Don’t know why the Oz people don’t like your cover. This Aussie thinks it’s great.
Another Aussie who thinks the QOS cover is fine!! Then again, who knows what they will come up with. Could be fantastic…or not!
They could stick QOS on the shelf with no cover at all and i’d still buy it, but it sucks we have to wait till august for TTTT.
Either way and whatever name goes down as author i’ll still be buying both. Thanks for the great adventures so far.
Thanks for the update on TTTT coming out in Australia. I went and asked at the bookshop last week and they hadn’t heard of it. Mind you, they are not very professional and I only go there because they are close to work. I was planning to go to a real bookshop later in the week. One where the staff are just a bit better trained, where they know that if you can’t find a book on one website, there might be others you could try . . .
Ohhh a longer wait, the cover looks great to me as is……. Anyway I will just have to wait until August, is only 46 days away.
Have just re-read the wildernes series and now cannot wait for QOS.Saw the cover on website and even though its different to the other covers it looks good to me. To me it represents a lot more the strong women theme running through the books. Hope it gets here sooner han August
have just bought and read all the wilderness novels as well and was excited that the next is coming soon…loved the stories. have always been attracted to that period in time and hope I was there as one of those strong woman! thanks Sarah ronna
rona — very kind of you to stop by and let me know. I’m so pleased you like the story thus far.
You mention dictating a story and I immediately imagined a bearded older gentleman pacing with purpose on a Persian rug in a dim library/study and a female secretary at his desk, typing out his thoughts. Why is that? Then I contrast that image with a comment in an article I just read through a link on Paperback Writer about women reading more fiction than men. “According to novelist Walter Kirn, “If novelists have become culturally invisible—at least to today’s men—it’s partly because the life of a novelist offers few rewards to the traditional male ego. It’s not about power, glory and money,”” from Lakshmi Chaudhry’s article Why Hemingway is Chick-Lit.
And I wonder – is typing still considered women’s work? Was it always? Just interesting thought paths, thanks.
Pam — when I was younger, typing was primarily a female occupation. However. The computer revolution changed that.
When it turned out that men needed to know the touch system, they changed the name of the classes from ‘typing’ to ‘keyboarding’ — really. At least in this country, every high schooler is required to take a keyboarding class. Male or female.
Someday I should track down where ‘keyboarding’ originated. Probably with some male school administrator who got all uncomfortable with the idea of making boys type.
I tried Dragon Naturally Speaking a few years back, and had so much trouble getting it to understand me. I talk fast. I talk like a Texan. It was not happy. But I’m determined to give it another go because I’m having so many RPS problems with my elbows and hands.
I used to dictate into a recorder anyway and then type that up, so I’m hoping if I can get the dragon trained, it will be a lot like that was. Except for having to speak the punctuation, grr.
Right now, it’s just too formal, not a flowing storytelling. I have a good microphone, but I also want to try a headphone so I don’t have to be tied to the desk.
I wrote about this when I got my new software. The voice recognition part works very well, and it learns if you take the time to teach it when it makes a mistake. However, I CANNOT make stuff up as I go along. Something about the kinetic process of typing frees my words, even for a comment like this. I tend to write notes longhand, like an exaggerated outline, and proceed from there. It saves about 80% of my typing and then I do edits/add text on the keyboard.
I got my off Amazon, and with the rebate, it cost me only about $48 and came with the microphone (which my daughter promptly chewed).
rebate? rebate?!? what rebate, she asked.
(Just thought I’d let you know [since you’re on my Bloglines feed] that the title bar on your entries says “individual entry archive”. Not sure if you want it to say something else!
The rebate was in November. Amazon was offering it for $80ish + free shipping, and Dragon offered a $40 rebate for purchases made through Thanksgiving. I wouldn’t have bought it for $80, and certainly not the $100 that the company sells it for on its website, but $40 is talking my language. Except now I have to go buy a new headset. Keep an eye out on Amazon because they frequently repeat rebates.