For three years, Miranda Grey-Solomon has kept her role as vampire Queen of the South separate from her Grammy-winning music career. But now, her dual lives are starting to collide, threatening everything Miranda and David, her Prime, have worked for.

To make matters worse, the entire Signet Council has descended upon Austin for its ten-year summit, bringing with it Prime James Hart of the Northeast, a sworn enemy come to take his revenge on those who defied him. As Hart’s machinations lead to outbreaks of violence across the South, Miranda and David receive an unexpected offer of help from David’s sire, an ancient and powerful vampire with knowledge that may be their salvation – or their doom.

Now all I have to do is finish writing it.  *laugh*

In related news, last weekend I attended ArmadilloCon, a literary SciFi/Fantasy convention held every year here in Austin. It was my very first con appearance, and I had a ton of fun – I am notoriously introverted and bad at people, but ArmadilloCon is very laid back and intimate. I got to meet a lot of other authors and hear their stories about publishing and writing genre fiction, and everyone I met was delightful.

I was on two discussion panels: “The Changing Face of Urban Fantasy” and “What’s New in Vampires,” which is kind of funny given that I really don’t know jack about urban fantasy, old face or new.

The truth is, I don’t read my own genre – not because I have anything against it, but because I haven’t found a series yet that I could get into.  I used to be big into high fantasy, like Mercedes Lackey, and I read some of her early UF (I was particularly fond of the Diana Tregarde mysteries) as well as a few other novels here and there, but the weird thing about me is I don’t read a lot of novels, period, and the ones I do tend more toward magical realism than urban fantasy.  My reading, as well as my writing, is kind of a mutt.  When interviewers ask me my favorite authors I know they’re expecting me to say Patricia Briggs or Devon Monk, but I usually say Joanne Harris and Barbara Kingsolver.

(As we discussed at the panel, the difference is that in magical realism (which was born primarily out of Latino culture) magical things happen and aren’t really remarked upon the way they are in urban fantasy.  Elizabeth Bear, one of my copanelists, put it this way: in urban fantasy, a unicorn walks into a diner and people say, “Whoa! Look! It’s a freaking unicorn!” whereas in magical realism a unicorn walks into a diner and someone says, “Hi, Bob, how’s it going?”)

One thing I learned for sure at the con was that I am woefully ignorant of the tropes of various genres (or, marketing categories, which is what they really are) and frankly, I’m fine with that.  I didn’t set out to write an urban fantasy series – and I definitely didn’t set out to write paranormal romance! I just wanted to tell the story as it came to me, and it turns out, it’s a bit…genre-bending. It starts out romantic, veers off into urban fantasy, then becomes quite epic, which as I learned at the con, UF generally eschews in favor of a more monster-of-the-week flavor, rather like a detective serial. In UF you have your (usually) kickass female protagonist chasing down monsters, solving occult crimes, et cetera, and you can kind of jump into the series at different points without losing much.

Yeah, um…I don’t do that.  I was a longtime fan of the Temperance Brennan novels so it’s not as if I’ve never enjoyed that kind of series…but that’s just not how I write.  I tell the story of the evolution of a group of characters, things are not totally wrapped up at the end of every novel – some things will be, but the overall arc is much bigger than that.  I love to view epic stories through the eyes of individuals, both those who shaped that story and those who were affected by it. But to skip any part of the story hobbles both the story and the reader – they can’t get as deeply into the minds of characters whose stories they only know pieces of.

I take a lot of my inspiration from the work of Joss Whedon (for which I can hear a big fat “DUH” from many of you), and Buffy the Vampire Slayer in particular comes to mind when I’m working on the Shadow World novels – I’m not writing about high school kids, but the two worlds do have elements in common, not the least of which is that they aren’t slavishly devoted to genre formulas.  Would you call Buffy paranormal romance because she shags Angel?  But what about Spike? That was hardly romantic, even before the attempted rape. And the whole Willow-Oz-Tara triangle was definitely not in line with traditional heterosexual norms.   But Buffy also kills vampires, and lots of other things, so it’s very urban fantasy…but they keep having to save the entire world, and there are season-long villain arcs, and Buffy is vulnerable and screws up and makes bad, bad choices…that’s the kind of story I want to tell, the kind of messy unraveling that feels real even when it’s about vengeance demons and bitchy primadonna gods.

One of the awesome things about the established authors I met at the con was that they all agreed: you have to write the story you have to write and not worry whose rules it violates.  You have to create the character in your head whether he or she is typical of a genre or not.  The best books, the ones that stay with us, are the ones that do something different than stick to the rules.  I think it’s dangerous for writers to allow their work to be pigeonholed the way so many books are nowadays in this age of “If you liked ____ series, you’ll like _____!” From a publishing standpoint I understand the appeal of having easily-categorized merchandise; publishing is a business, after all, and their business is getting books in people’s hands.  Creatively, though, I am thankful I’ve had the opportunity to just tell the story and not freak out over “But is it REALLY URBAN FANTASY???”

Hell if I know.

And that’s okay by me.

 Spread throughout the dark corners of our world lies the Shadow World, a society of vampires who feed off the living. In Austin, Texas, one woman must find her place within that world, before she loses everything…

It’s been three months since musician Miranda Grey became a vampire and married David Solomon, Prime of the South. As Queen, Miranda must quickly come to terms with her new role and learn how to negotiate the treacherous waters of Signet politics, inevitably making dangerous enemies along the way.

As if complicated vampire politics and a rising music career weren’t enough, an enigmatic but powerful force from David’s past appears, leaving a wake of chaos and uncertainty for the Pair’s fledgling relationship. Miranda begins to realize how little she really knows about her husband. But when an assassin begins targeting her friends and allies, the Pair must track down the killer, even as their lives hang in the balance…

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While you’re at it,

Check out an interview with yours truly over at Book Lovers, Inc.