The Tainted City (a.k.a. Stadt der Magier) releases in Germany

Die Chroniken von Ninavel continues in Germany, hooray!  Today's the release date for Stadt der Magier ("City of Mages"), the German edition of The Tainted City.  Hope German readers enjoy it as much as they seem to have Die Blutmagier ("The Bloodmages") / The Whitefire Crossing.  I'll admit I have fun practicing my (rusty) German by reading the occasional blog reviews auf Deutsch that Google alerts sends to me.

In other news, Reddit's r/Fantasy forum put together a 225-book ranked list of "Under-read and under-rated fantasy", which also got featured on Tor.com - and The Whitefire Crossing is #3.  Sweet!  Seriously, it's great to know that those who've read my book feel strongly that more people should read it. Whitefire is in some pretty stellar company there, too. If you're looking for great fantasy to read, the list is a terrific resource.  My own TBR pile has sure gotten a heck of a lot longer.

In other other news, I'll be making an announcement soon about plans for The Labyrinth of Flame's release (at long last!) - so stay tuned.  And now, back to revision I go...

The German edition of The Tainted City (Stadt der Magier) has a cover & release date!

Halfway through NaNoWriMo, and I'm right around 25K words written for the month so far.  24,553, to be exact, though that number will increase further after tonight's writing session.  I'm quite pleased, especially considering I've managed it even while taking my son to visit family in Alabama, followed by coming down with a horrendous virus that knocked me flat for three straight days.  Fortunately, I've been striving for 2K per day, so when I had two days of 0 wordcount during my illness, it didn't set me back too badly!  Right now I'm at the point where I can actually count scenes until the end of my Labyrinth of Flame draft, which is pretty exciting.  Really looking forward to finishing this rough draft so I can start serious revision, the part I love most.

In other good news, the German edition of The Tainted City is officially up on Amazon.de, ready for pre-order.  Complete with new cover art and title, of course!  Die Chroniken von Ninavel: Stadt der Magier, a.k.a The Chronicles of Ninavel: City of Mages (or perhaps, City of the Mages).  Release date is May 16, 2014.  Check out the new cover!

Very atmospheric, even if the desert looks more Sahara-like than Mojave-like. For those who haven't been to the Owens Valley in California, which was my inspiration for Ninavel's environs, here's a picture:

The Mojave desert in the Owens Valley.  Lots of sagebrush and prickly pear cactus, not so many sand dunes.

But the thing about covers is, they're not meant to be exact depictions of the world within the book.  They're meant to SELL the book.  So I'm quite happy with the German cover - I think it looks intriguing and evocative, and goes quite nicely with their cover for the first book.  I hope German readers agree!

And now, back to the word mines. The end of Labyrinth is in sight...