LKH, Author at Laurell K. Hamilton

One more sleep until Smolder and welcome spring!

Happy Spring Equinox and Blessed Ostara! Smolder, the latest Anita Blake novel comes out tomorrow! I can’t wait to share it with you all, but it’s extra special this year of 2023, because this is the 30^th anniversary of the Anita Blake series. We’re starting the celebration with two events. March 21^st St. Louis HiPointe theater live and in person with a virtual streaming of that both version require a ticket. It’s hosted by Left Bank books. Everyone’s been lovely and agreed to mask for me, I got long covid and to keep me safe and writing more books for all of you, I’ve asked everyone to mask. Thanks again. March 22^nd for all of you that couldn’t make it to St. Louis there is a Barnes & Noble ticketed virtual event where William MCCaskey, my co-editor from Fantastic Hope will be asking your questions live online! You also get a signed copy of Smolder, but to get your questions answered and your signed copy you need to get your ticket to the event ASAP.

The College Professor and Dr. Seuss

Once when I still believed I’d get my doctorate in English literature, and write on school breaks, one of my favorite teachers had an epiphany in our upper level lit class.

One fine spring day, a literature prof named, Dr. Lalka declared that he would not read children’s literature to his soon to be born baby. He would read them only Literature, serious Literature like Shakespeare and Chaucer, Keats and Shelley. Children’s books he doubly declared, damaged a child’s brain and ruined their chance to love real Literature.

The eight students sitting around his table all looked at each other. He called them his little Cherubs, and they called him, Doc. They were the pride and joy of his students. The best, the brightest of them all. Those eight shining stars stared at each other and then with shared smiles began to recite, GREEN EGGS AND HAM by Dr. Seuss. His little cherubs spoke very word from beginning to end, leaving out nothing, remembering it all though it had been many years since they had read it.

That college professor named, Doc began to blush, pink at the beginning then red and redder and reddest of all until he had to bend down his head and recover himself. When once more he could speak, he said, that perhaps there was more to these children’s books than he had first thought and maybe among all the Shakespeare and Chaucer he might sneak a few stories with less thee’s and thou’s and more Sneetches and Loraxes.

His little cherubs rejoiced in that college classroom, knowing they’d saved Doc’s baby from the doom of being forced to grow up far, far too soon.

Happy Birthday to Dr. Seuss! Happy World Reading Day to everyone! Hope you’ve had a lovely one.

Smolder Pre-Order Gifts

Have you Pre-ordered Smolder, the next Anita Blake novel coming March 2023? If you have, please go to this form and fill it out to receive your own bookmark and holiday card from Anita and the Gang!

First Bird of the Year 2023

What was your first bird of the year? The first bird you saw outside on New Year’s Day. Mine was cardinal for the second year in a row, but 2022 it was a single scarlet male the only color in a winter landscape full of snow. This year the day was gray looking more like late November here than December. Three female cardinals fluttered around the bird feeders their soft brownish tan bodies with the tips of faint red at crest, wing and tail blending into the dead leaves and bare trees so that only their movement betrayed them. The first bird traditionally tells us what the coming year will be like, or what will be important to us. I have had January firsts where the birds all hid and I saw mammals, squirrels one year, and a cat one year. But it’s usually a bird, then you have to figure out what the message is for the year. Squirrels for me are to balance work and play better. Cat, was a sign to ask my allergist if I could have my first cat. That was a really wonderful moment after twenty years of allergy shots. Doves usually mean it’s going to be a year of matters of the heart, or issues associated with Goddess. Cardinals usually mean I need to be willing to be seen more, to stand out and say, look at me! It’s a lesson I struggle with like most writers, because on one hand we want our books to be wildly popular and sell tons, and make us tons of money to go with all those sales, but we are also usually introverts and shy, or at least more comfortable at our desks than doing interviews or public appearances. Even if we’re good at the public side it drains us. I was not happy with last year’s message of bright red cardinal, but female cardinal is a little less flashy. She does most of the egg sitting in the spring because her coloring lets her blend in and not attract predators while the male is the stalking horse saying, look at me and don’t look for our nest. Do I get to hunker down at home and nest this year? Cardinals don’t stop with laying eggs and raising chicks just once in the spring, unlike most song birds they will rinse and repeat two to three times a year. Here in Missouri where the weather stays mild longer I’ve seen them still feeding fledglings in early October. Though that’s a chancy month in the Midwest, because we can get a freak October snowfall. The year I noticed them feeding in October the weather stayed mild, luckily. They build a fresh nest for each set of eggs, probably because even the slowest predator might figure out where their nest is if they keep going to the same location to feed babies from March to October. Once they successful raise all their young then it’s time to form winter flocks with the juvenile birds who look just like mom. The males won’t get Dad’s bright red plumage until next spring, so the threesome I saw by the feeders on January 1st probably weren’t all females, but mom and chicks all camouflaged together to up the chances of this year’s babies surviving the winter without getting eaten by a hawk, or other predator. Maybe that’s my lesson for the coming year that I don’t have to be the brightest thing in view, but just concentrate on laying as many eggs (ideas) and raising as many chicks (books) as possibly this year. Be wildly productive and concentrate on writing new stories, and don’t put all my eggs in one nest, basket like the cardinal I’ll up my chances of success by having multiple nests for different broods (ideas/novels/stories) and concentrate on raising them until their ready to fly on their own and share with all of you.

Smolder Cover and Cover Copy

I’m so excited to share the beautiful cover and spoiler free cover copy of Smolder, the next Anita Blake novel with you!
Hints and one reveal that starts on page one, so I’m not giving anything away.

Vampire hunter Anita Blake is no stranger to killing monsters. It’s part of her job as a Preternatural US Marshal, after all. But even her experience isn’t enough to stop something that is bent on destroying everything—and everyone—she loves.

Anita Blake is engaged to Jean-Claude, the new vampire king of America. Humans think she’s gone over to the side of the monsters. The vampires fear that their new king has fallen under the spell of the most powerful necromancer in a thousand years.

In the midst of wedding preparations—including getting Edward, aka U.S Marshal Ted Forrester, fitted as best man—Anita gets a call that the local police need her expertise at a brutal murder scene linked to a nationwide slaughter of vampires and humans, dubbed the Sunshine Murders.

But there is more than just a murderer to catch: an ancient evil has arrived in St. Louis to challenge Jean-Claude for his crown, his life, Anita, and all they hold dear. Even with Jean-Claude’s new powers as king and Anita’s necromancy, it isn’t enough, however; they must embrace their triumvirate, or allow primeval darkness to spread across the country, possessing first the vampires and then the humans. Evil will triumph unless Jean-Claude and Anita can prove that love conquers all.

Available March 21, 2023!

Artemis I Launch

When I was a little girl I saw a man walk on the moon. I still remember that grainy black and white film that showed Neil Armstrong taking that small step for man and giant leap for mankind. That was July 20, 1969. Men landing on the moon for the first time ever was one of the goals of NASA’s Apollo program.

Tomorrow morning, August 29, 2022 you have a chance to see the first launch in America’s second reach for the moon when the first of the Artemis missions sends an uncrewed spacecraft into the sky. By 2025 they are planning to put another set of American astronauts on the moon.

We can all watch it together live on Twitch starting at 6:30 EDT. Maybe we’ll get our moon base someday after all. EDIT: August 29 launch attempt was scrubbed. Next launch is September 3rd. Check the NASA website for more information.

In honor of Artemis being the sister of Apollo I’m going to list books that are all about the ladies and the theme of the moon and space exploration. (Yes, technically Diana is the Roman equivalent and Artemis is Greek which makes her brother, Phoebus, not Apollo, but Artemis sounds better, so let’s cross those Greek and Roman streams and go with it.)

Fiction:

The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal and it’s sequel, The Fated Sky.

Nonfiction:

The Women of the Moon: Tales of Science, Love, Sorrow, and Courage by Daniel Altshuler & Fernando Ballesteros.

Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly

Rafael was released

Rafael came out February 9th, in both the US and UK. If you missed it, maybe that’s because it wasn’t originally scheduled. It was sort of a surprise book to me, and my publisher. How does a surprise book happen? Well, there was little thing called a pandemic and a lockdown and, well you know the rest. We all lived it, are living it. I reached out to as many fans as I could on as many social platforms as I could and the one thing that all of you asked for was, more stories. You told me that my books were your refuge away from the real-life craziness, but even though Sucker Punch had come out in August of 2020 as scheduled, you wanted/needed more now. You needed more books now, not later, but now. I heard you, and I went to my publisher and said, “If I could write you a shorter Anita Book like Jason or Micah, could we do that?”

The answer was obviously yes, but then I had to go to my list of characters that hadn’t had their stories told yet, and your requests for people you wanted to see front and center more. Rafael and the wererats were some of the most requested. Rafael is literally tall, dark and handsome. He’s a man of honor, a warrior, and a king, so why hadn’t he had his own book yet? Good question, and finally I had a good answer.

But a funny thing happened when I sat down to write the “short” book. It kept growing bigger. It’s over double the size of Jason, and longer than Micah, in fact Rafael turned out to be long enough to be a hardback novel like my regular books, but my publisher had made space in their lineup for an original paperback and so, that’s what Rafael is, an original paperback that’s long enough to be one of my hardbacks. I should have realized that Rafael would make the book bigger and more serious, he’s just not a light and fluffy kind of guy. I should also have realized that the first time for the Rodere, the wererats to be front and center in a book they’d need room to stretch and show all the wonderful culture that hasn’t been seen on stage before. The wererats have been quietly building their powerbase for years, and in some books not so quietly building, but now the cat, or rat is out of the bag. I’m so excited to finally share the world of the wererats with everyone. They turned out to be even more complex and magical than I’d expected.

There was another reason for me to agree with all the people that wanted Rafael to have his own book, 2020-early 2021 was the year of the Rat, and that meant wererats and Rafael in Anita’s world, and in ours.

Protest + Vote

We’ve all watched helplessly as Mr. George Floyd was murdered in front of us on video. Some of us have taken to the streets to protest his death at the hands of a police officer, the very person that should have been saving his life, not taking it. We all agree with the horror and outrage of it, but not with the violence that has broken out at some of the protests, but one thing we do agree on is that we want change. We, as human beings and Americans, do not want to see another black man, woman, or child hurt because of the color of their skin, especially not by the police who are supposed to serve and protect us all. How do we bring about real change? First we protest, and then we vote for the change we want to make. We vote in people that will monitor the police and make sure an officer with as many complaints against him as, the policeman who killed Mr. Floyd would have been fired long ago. (I purposefully did not use the policeman’s name here, because I don’t want to put his name in the same sentence with George Floyd.)

I thought we’ll vote in better people to the senate and the congress, and of course the presidency. I mean those are the elected officials that will help us make sure this never happens again, right? Actually, that’s not right. In fact congress, the senate, and the president have very little impact on local police, or any local politics really. You know those little, local elections that most of us skip? Those are where the power to change city and county police reside in your city, my city, our counties, all of it. I was shocked to find out how much power aldermen have. If you already knew this, you’re ahead of me and you can skim for a bit, but for the rest of us, let’s learn together.

It’s the Mayor and aldermen, or a committee that they put together, that hires or appoints the Chief of Police, or Police Commissioner. If you want a committee to oversee police and race relations in your area, it’s the Mayor or usually an alderman who chooses the people that will review any complaints. In some cities the Mayor has almost nothing to do with the police and it’s mostly done by the alderman, but look up how your city and county are organized, because it varies.

There are some cities where you can vote for Sheriff, or Chief of Police, or Commissioner, but it’s more typical that we get to vote for the people that appoint them. Check how it works in your local area, so you’ll know where your vote can count the most to bring about the changes you want at a local level like city and county police.

We will be voting in our county municipal elections tomorrow, so if you live in St. Louis County this is your chance to vote for Mayor, alderman, municipal bonds that can help fund everything from schools to sewer improvement for your city. Please check your own city and county for the local elections so that you can help choose who is in charge of your local police, or who sets policy for them.

We’re voting as a family tomorrow, and we’ll be paying a lot more attention to our aldermen and all the smaller local politicians than we ever did before, because they are the politicians that will help us make sure that we don’t have to have slogans like, Black Lives Matter, because it will be a given, a surety that the color of a person’s skin will not matter to the police or anyone else, because we are all in this together, and together is how we can make the changes we all want.

20 things I’ve learned about true love –

1. If you dread going home to the love of your life, they aren’t.

2. If you’d been happily married over ten years and people tell you, you’re lucky, it’s not luck – you’ve all worked your asses off to stay this happy.

3. Mind blowing sexual passions can last for decades, but you both have to want it, crave it, work at it.

4. Yes, I said you have to work at keeping passion alive in your long term relationships. Why does everyone think that they can work at their careers, their friendships, their family, their kids, their hobbies, but that great sex will just take care of itself? It doesn’t.

5. Find someone who is passionate about you in the bedroom and out of it.

6. Talk to each other, not just about the bills, or who’s driving the kids to soccer practice, or who picked up the dry cleaning, but about things that interest you. Bring your stories, your dreams, your goals, your fancies to each other always.

7. Get in shape together, or at least at the same time. Keep each other healthy. Or at least don’t sabotage each other.

8. Don’t go to bed angry.

9. Don’t be afraid to go to couple’s therapy.

10. Don’t be afraid to push each other outside your comfort zones, but remember to find enough comfort in your lives for you to all be happy.

11. If something is bothering you in the relationship talk about it early, before resentment builds up.

12. Remember that most big fights aren’t about the dirty clothes on the floor, the burnt dinner, the missed appointment, or whatever you think you’re fighting about. It’s about how it makes your partner, or you feel. The dirty sock on the floor can be the straw that broke the camel’s back, but it’s not the whole camel.

13. Schedule couple time regularly and make sure you both agree on what that time is used for, or take turns deciding.

14. Schedule alone time, remember each of you was a whole person before you found each other. Being in a relationship doesn’t change that.

15. Being in love should help you be more of who you are, a better, happier version of you. If you feel worse, sad, and miserable, then something has gone wrong.

16. There will be days when you’re sad, exhausted, overwhelmed, that’s normal. Being in love, even true love, doesn’t mean being happy every minute of every day. Only worry when the bad days out number the good for months. The good should out weigh the bad in a relationship, but it won’t get rid of all the bad stuff in your lives. This is true love, not a Disney Princess movie. (With apologies to both Frozen and Frozen 2.)

17. Remember to kiss and cuddle often. Both are proven mood boosters, and help keep our pair bond with our partners stronger. This is science people.

18. Try to find someone who’s level of skin hunger matches your own. Do not assume that the level of passion in the early days is normal for both of you. Discuss your expectations for passion and touching as the years go by. You’d be surprised at the number of people that assume passion will cool and that’s normal. If you both agree on that, great, but if only half of you agrees that’s a problem. I’m not just talking sex here, but literally the amount of touching, hand holding, kissing, physical affection in general.

19. You can grow together as a couple, or you can grow apart from each other. Choose wisely.

20. Remember that falling in love is the beginning of your story together, not the end.

The House Is On Fire

Jerked awake with the fire alarm blaring. You tumble out of bed, grab your family, your pets, and head for the nearest exit. You escape the fire with your loved ones, then you call the fire department and hope they can save your house. That’s what you’re supposed to do, right? What if instead you and your family are running from the fire and you stop with the door insight, but you all start arguing with each other on what started the fire. Was it an electrical short, did someone leave a candle burning, was the stove left on, and your family begins to accuse each other of starting the fire while you’re still inside the burning house? Instead of escaping with your lives, you stay inside the fire and fight about whose fault the fire is instead of escaping.

You’re probably reading this and thinking, “Who would do that? No one would do that?”

Australia is on fire, literally(https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/australia-fires-deadly-wildfire-photos-2019-2020/). This is after California was on fire (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/california-wildfires). The Amazon was on fire (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Amazon_rainforest_wildfires). Our house is on fire and we’re arguing whose caused the fire. We’re so busy pointing fingers and shouting at each other that it’s your fault, their fault, that we aren’t putting out the fire and saving as many lives as we can. Priorities, my fellow earthlings, priorities. Let’s put out the fires, lets figure out how to save the polar bears as the ice melts, lets save the bees and all the other insects. They’re food for birds as well as the major pollinators for our food crops. If we lose our insects, we are next, for so many reasons. But I’m not here to be all doom and gloom, I’m here to share some hope. We can do this. We can put out the fires both real and metaphorical. We can turn around or come up with new solutions for what’s happening to our planet, our home. I don’t believe that we have these great big brains for nothing, or that we have compassionate hearts for no purpose.

I’d planned on writing this blog last night, because the Australian government didn’t seem to be supporting their rural firefighters or rescuing the animals trapped in the fires. This morning the Prime Minister of Australia has promised two billion to support fire relief efforts (https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/australia-commits-billions-dollars-wildfire-recovery-n1111021), so I thought I would skip this blog where I was going to list charities to send your money and mine to today, and then I realized that money promised isn’t money in the pockets of charities today. It’s a promise and eventually they will get the money, but no government gives out that kind of cash quickly. They want to be sure it goes to the right place, or where they think is the right place. The charities will have to jump through some bureaucratic hoops to get some of the funds, that’s just the way it works, so … here’s a list of charities. If you give a dollar today it will get to them quicker than the billions promised. If everyone who reads this blog gives a dollar, or five dollars, or whatever they can afford it will help.

See, there’s the hope to share. We can help each other. We can grab each other by the hand even if we are thousands of miles away and give hope and real help to each other. Give a dollar, send the donations that people are asking for, we are not helpless in the face of all this, if we work together to save each other and the other riders on this big, beautiful planet.

If we stop arguing about how we got here and start working to come up with solutions, we can all get out of the fire, and we can save our home, this planet at the same time.

These are Charites related to the fire that have been vetted by news sources, (CBS affiliated News) and the links are reputable.

These are vetted links to the fire fighters

https://www.rfs.nsw.gov.au/volunteer/support-your-local-brigade

https://www.cfa.vic.gov.au/about/supporting-cfa

https://cfsfoundation.org.au/donate

https://www.rfbaq.org/donate-to-rfbaq

Charities helping General

https://au.gofundme.com/f/fire-relief-fund-for-first-nations-communities

https://www.redcross.org.au/campaigns/disaster-relief-and-recovery-donate#donate

https://www.communityenterprisefoundation.com.au/make-a-donation/bushfire-disaster-appeal/

https://donate.vinnies.org.au/appeals-nsw/vinnies-nsw-bushfire-appeal-nsw

https://frrr.org.au/cb_pages/supporting_bushfire-affected_communities.php