Author C.E. Murphy Guest Blog and Contest LIVE Here!
Ooh, it’s been ages since I stretched my legs at Bitten By Books!
Last time I did, actually, was to discuss whitewashed cover art for my Negotiator Trilogy (aka the Old Races books), and indeed, I’m back today to talk more about the Old Races.
It happens that that trilogy was extremely difficult to write. I mean, like, between three books I rewrote them something like seventeen times, and I must have written close to a million words for what ended up as 375K worth of story. You will not, then, be surprised that I swore I was never going to write another book in that world. And so far, I haven’t.
I *have*, though, been committing short stories and novellas over the place. I didn’t really mean to. It’s just that—well, sick to death of the world or not, I knew I hadn’t gone anywhere near telling all the stories in it. There were three in particular I’d always known about: the story of London burning, the story of Chicago burning, and Grace O’Malley’s story.
Over the past few years, I’ve told two of those stories at novella length: Year of Miracles is the story of London burning in 1666, and HOT TIME IN THE OLD TOWN TONIGHT is the story of the Great Chicago Fire. (KISS OF ANGELS, Grace’s story, is still in the works.)
One of them—HOT TIME—is being traditionally published by Subterranean Press in this month’s release, BABA YAGA’S DAUGHTER, along with nine other stories that fill in the background and some of the future of the Old Races world.
The other, though, I’ve plunged into self-publication with, and it’s been an utterly fascinating journey.
First off, one of the huge advantages of self-publication is that I’ve got total control over my cover art. And I am, let me tell you, very picky about self-published cover art, because this is my job. I’m a professional. I need to present myself to you, the reader, professionally every single time, whether it’s a traditionally published piece or an experimental e-release. So I worked with a cover artist for all three of the short story collections I’ve done, and the coolest part, hands down, of these covers, is finally getting to represent my main character, Margrit Knight, accurately:
I love the cover art for the other two collections as well, but actually seeing Margrit as a black woman is just so exciting that Icannot get over it. This is so much more how I envisioned her, and I so wish my original Negotiator cover art could have represented her more accurately.
But that’s only been one aspect of the fun of all of this. The Aftermath collection is entirely stories set after the Negotiator Trilogy. The other two, Origins and Year of Miracles—well, Origins sometimes really does tell origin stories, but as often it’s just setting pieces into play for things that happen in the trilogy.
I realized as I was writing them that many of them are a little tragic…but then, they’re set in a time when the Old Races are dying, and have no real hope for a future. I like to think they carry some power because of that.
And, well, Year of Miracles is the Old Races’ greatest love story, so delving into it and learning its details as the writer was quite wonderful. The fact that I’m able to write them and share them through e-pub these days is really incredible to me—they’re stories that really might not have been told, otherwise. So I’m excited to have them out there, and I hope people are excited to get a chance to fill in some details of the Old Races world!
I’m almost certainly going to be revisiting the world of the Old Races with more stories in the future, so tell me—if you’re already a reader of the series, whose stories might you like to see?
If you haven’t read them yet, I’ll be giving away a copy of each of the e-collections to commentors on this blog, so this is a great time to be introduced to the Old Races!
And if you just can’t wait and must go buy the stories right away, this link brings you to my website, where links to Amazon, B&N and Smashwords are all available!
Looking forward to talking with you all in comments! Please, if you have any questions about the Old Races world, or comments, or anything, fire ‘em at me! I’ll be around all day to answer! 
-CE Murphy
Author Bio:
According to friends, C.E. Murphy “is a thin veneer over a woman who is constantly moving and shaking. In between walking to Mordor and back, swimming, dancing, and attending Bon Jovi concerts, she squeezes out a book or two every three days.” Also according to friends, she began her writing career when she ran away from home at age five to write copy for the circus that had come to town. It is clear to her that she should let her friends write all of her biographies, because they’re much more interesting that way.
Her own recollections suggest she began writing around age six, when she submitted three poems to a school publication. The teacher producing the magazine selected (inevitably) the one she thought was by far the worst, but also told her–a six year old kid–to keep writing, which she has. She has also held the usual grab-bag of jobs usually seen in an authorial biography, including public library volunteer (at ages 9 and 10; it’s clear she was doomed to a career involving books), archival assistant, cannery worker, and web designer. Writing books is better, and she now has close to twenty in print. In her down time, she writes comic books and short stories, which may be why her editor and agent independently suggested she get a hobby that *wasn’t* writing.
She was born and raised in Alaska, and now lives in her ancestral homeland of Ireland, which is a magical land where it rains a lot but winter never actually arrives.
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Readers, learn more about C.E. Murphy here:
Read the Bitten by Books reviews of the author’s work here.
Newsletter : http://groups.google.com/group/cemurphy-announcements
Blog : http://mizkit.com/ or http://mizkit.livejournal.com/
http://cemurphy.net
http://twitter.com/ce_murphy
http://www.facebook.com/pages/CE-Murphy/46086704983
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I absolutely love (and own) all of your books, Catie. I’m looking forward to receiving my copy of Baba Yaga’s Daughter soonish. I ordered it back in January.
Long time fan. Really looking forward to the next Walker Papers book
Hi everybody! I’m here all day* to answer questions about the Old Races and anything else you might want to ask! Hit me with your best shot!
*Okay, when I say “all day” I mean “It’s already 7pm where I am and I’m not staying up all night answering questions, but I’ll pick up with answers in the morning and be available all day tomorrow too!”
I am so happy to see more stories set in this world! (And I have mine on order too.) It has been a while since I’ve read my copies, so I can’t think of anything clever to ask about the Old Races.
so I’ll just *wave* instead
I’m about halfway through Aftermath, and I can not *WAIT* to see what happens after Ursula’s story. She took quite a gamble. : )
Do we ever find out what happened after Sarah went to see Daisani and Janx? I’m dying to read about it!! (That was mentioned in one of the other short stories, wasn’t it? It would not surprise me if I dreamed it happened, lol.)
We sure haven’t found out yet, Jackie….
I have enjoyed reading your collections of books – “Negotiator” “The Walker Papers” – “Negotiator companion stories” – ” The Worldwalker duology” & ” The Stongbox Chronicles”. I love that you have created many stong female leads who are not perfect but are very capable and endearing to the reader. I love the epologue that you wrote for “The Phoenix Law”. Wish that I could find “the Strongbox chronicles in hardcopy – would love to add them to my collection of your works. Also have your comic books “Take a Chance”. It has been a refreshing ride living in your books. Thank you.
Oh, you’ve read the Strongbox books AND the comic! A true fan! <3
I think you can find the Strongbox Chronicles in hard copy through secondhand sellers on Amazon. I'd help you out, but I'm entirely out of my author copies of those…
-Catie
Is there going to be any more storyline about Hajnal, Biali’s daughter? This character could hold great potential for a story. Just don’t kill her off, I can relate with her life.
I make no promises about killing or not killing people off, but if I continue with the Old Races stories, I’m quite sure we’ll see more of her!
I missed your chat. I am so sorry. But I do enjoy all of your books. I need to catch up on the ones I am behind on. I am not up on the Old Races. But I will definitely have to read up on them. I do enjoy short story books. Do you plan on more stories like this?
Ah, sure and you didn’t miss me, I’m basically around all week.
I think I’ll almost certainly be doing more stories set in the Old Races universe. I’m surprised at how much I’ve loved writing shorts and novellas for that world!
thanks for a great post! Love!!!! all of your books
For a first timer to your books which one would you recommend? (it can be the favorite book you enjoyed writing the best)
Oh, start with URBAN SHAMAN, since it’s my first published book. If I was choosing favorites–well, it’s possible BABA YAGA’S DAUGHTER, the collection of Old Races short stories, is my current favorite, but it’s also expensive and not really the one I’d recommend *starting* with. Besides, my favorites pretty much change every time a new book comes out…
-Catie
Since you live in Ireland… Place I really love to visit. For a newbie to Ireland what place would you recommend a tourist to see first? What cuisine to try. What Drink etc>
Do you incorporate a bit of celtic lore and mythology in your writing? Since I believe Ireland to be filled and brimming with magic of its own kind.
The Walker Papers in particular have a lot of Irish mythology and monsters in them!
Hi there! I love the Negotiator series. I actually have the Walking Papers series too, but haven’t had a chance to get to them yet. I really enjoyed the audio version of Negotiator, I think Eve Bianco did a great job as narrator. With all the short stories you’ve been putting out there, do you think you will ever put them in audio format?
Ah, see, audio books are something that my publisher handles, so I have no experience with getting them made at all. I’m acquainted with my Walker Papers reader, and we might do a project next year, but I don’t see anything on the plate for audio versions of the Old Races shorts, I’m sad to say!
I have a thing about book covers that don’t match the innards, which I won’t go into. Because it’s been a long day and I think one of my book cover rants would descend into word mess. So I’ll just say I can’t express how happy I am that you love your cover and that it matches the actual character! Yay!
I haven’t started this series, but I have read your other series, which I love! So I’m going to start re-forming the TBR list and I’ll have to shove The Old Races to the top now.
And 1 million to 375 K! I don’t even know how you managed that, so bravo!
So I have to ask how exactly did you manage that? Did you eliminate side stories or just condense the heck out of it?
Oh, gad. I managed it by throwing out hundreds of thousands of Wrong Words. Really, the story never changed, just the way I told it did. Which doesn’t make very much sense when I say it, but I can’t figure out any other way to explain it…!
Sadly, the covers for the original trilogy don’t really match, but the e-pubbed stuff certainly does, and I loooove it.
No! Actually, Wrong Words totally makes sense! Thanks.
I think that Year of Miracles may be the first crowdfunded project I ever participated in — and I very much enjoyed it!
What advice would you give to someone considering doing a crowdfunded project?
My best advice is to already have an audience you can draw on, because one of the hardest parts about crowdfunding is raising awareness of it.
Other than that–and I’m not shunting you off, but I’ve talked about this a lot in blog posts, so other than that, go read these:
http://cemurphy.net/archives/898
http://cemurphy.net/archives/917
http://cemurphy.net/archives/921
have not read your books yet but always looking for books to read that I have not .
I’m glad that the cover art of your books is accurate. I always find it annoying when I star reading the book and find that it’s different that what the cover told me it would be. Of course, sometimes that’s a good thing:)
I think all the hard work you put into the Negotiator trilogy shows. They are my three favorite books out of all your work.
Oh, <3, Adrianne, thank you. I think they turned out well, but wow they were exhausting to write!
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