One down, one to go

I've obviously not been writing posts to this blog for a while and will not be for a few more weeks, alas. However, I've finished writing the novella for the dragon anthology (Dragon Magic) earlier this month, thank goodness. So, meanwhile, you may amuse yourselves by reading the excerpt of "Anna and the King of Dragons."

It'll be published by Signet/Penguin Putnam, and will also feature novellas on the theme of dragons by Mary Jo Putney, Jo Beverley, and Barbara Samuel. I've had the great pleasure of collaborating with these wonderful authors before on the Faery Magic anthology, back in 1996, and once again, I think we have a winner. Each of us feature a dragon in our stories, and each of us have our own particular cultural take on them. Mine's a Japanese dragon, since my mother is Japanese, and she in fact has seen a dragon's cave on the island of Kyushu herself, not far from Arita, a city that's famous for its porcelain (it's from this city that the original Imari ware and the Dutch Delftware first came). So it's in that area that I have set the story.

I've woven in some folklore into the story; my mother used to tell me stories of the kami-sama--the nature spirits--that abound in Japanese folk and fairy tales. The kami-sama are akin to the faeries of Celtic legend, in that they have magical powers and are also shape-changers and sometimes tricksters.

I'm afraid the anthology won't be out until April of 2007, but at least I have an excerpt posted!

--Karen H.