Oookay, then!
Sorry to be so late in getting this post up; I’ve been in New Mexico for the last week, and the internet connection there was Just Abysmal; could barely keep it open long enough to tweet, let alone upload anything longer.
First things first: Upcoming appearances.
I’m flying to New York on Monday, and will be appearing (briefly) at the RWA convention, held at the Marriott Marquis. Appearances will be:
The Literacy Signing, where most of the published authors taking part will be available to sell/sign books—this is from 5:30-7:30 on June 28th, at the Marriott Marquis. This event _is_ open to the public, and I _believe_ that you’re allowed to bring in up to three of your own books from home to be signed, if you like.
The opening panel of the convention, where I’ll be taking part in a discussion with two other Random House authors, Steve Berry and Tess Gerritsen. This is part of the convention and open only to convention attendees. It’ll be from 8:30-10:00 AM on June 29th.
Then on July 5th—publication date for the cool new 20th-anniversary OUTLANDER edition!—I fly to Laramie Wyoming, where I’ll be doing the keynote speech for the Sir Walter Scott conference at the University of Wyoming. The conference program is here http://www.uwyo.edu/scottconf2011/program.html , but I don’t yet have a detailed personal schedule. I _will_ be doing at least one public book-signing, though; will post time and place as soon as I get them.
On July 8th, I fly _back_ to New York, for ThrillerFest, at the Hyatt. There, I’ll be doing a Livestream event with James Rollins (Powell’s Books is supplying books to be sold during this event—and I certainly _hope_ they’ll have the 20th-anniversary edition!) from 2-4:00 PM on July 8th.
On the evening of July 8th, I’ll be doing a joint signing with several other authors for a collaborative mystery novel called NO REST FOR THE DEAD. (This is one of those for-charity efforts—proceeds for this one go to cancer research—where a number of well-known authors take turns writing chapters, and the editor then goes through and kind of smooths things out so the story is coherent. Or so we hope, anyway.)
The signing will be held at 7:00 PM at the Center for Fiction, (17 East 47th Street, New York, NY 10017), and authors attending will include Peter James, Marcia Talley, John Lescroart, RL Stine, Diana Gabaldon,Jeffery Deaver, Gayle Lynds and Andrew Gulli. (Just for my own part, I’m fine with people bringing their own books to be signed, too.) This is open to the public.
Aaaand, on July 9th, I’ll do a Spotlight Interview (at the Hyatt) for ThrillerFest, Kathleen Antrim being the interviewer. That’s from 1:00-1:50 PM. And then I’ll do a book-signing for the convention (open only to convention attendees) from 5:00-6:00 PM at the convention bookstore in the hotel.
Then I rush home on the 10th {g}, and do the Official Launch Party for the 20th-anniversary OUTLANDER on July 11th, at The Poisoned Pen bookstore in Scottsdale. 7:00 PM!
Righto. Now, I had promised to show you the two openings I have for SCOTTISH PRISONER. As it stands, I’m opening the book with Jamie’s point of view—but I _could_ open with Lord John’s first chapter instead, and do Jamie’s second. I did it this way because I’d like people to realize right away that this is Jamie’s book, as much as Lord John’s—but it _is_ a Rather Unusual {cough} way to open a book.
So—those of you who don’t read excerpts should stop Right Here.
Those of you who _do_…here you go, and hope you enjoy them! Let me know what you think: Jamie first, or Lord John?
THE SCOTTISH PRISONER
(Copyright 2011 Diana Gabaldon)
Chapter 1:
Helwater, the Lake District
April 1, 1760
It was so cold out, he thought his cock might break off in his hand. If he could find it. The thought passed through his sleep-mazed mind like one of the small, icy drafts that darted through the loft, making him open his eyes.
He could find it now; had waked with his fist wrapped round it and desire shuddering and twitching over his skin like a cloud of midges. The dream was wrapped just as tightly round his mind, but he knew it would fray in seconds, shredded by the snores and farts of the other grooms. He needed her, needed to spill himself with the feel of her touch still on him.
Hanks stirred in his sleep, chuckled loudly, said something incoherent, and fell back into the void, murmuring, “Bugger, bugger, bugger…”
Jamie said something similar under his breath in the Gaelic, and flung back his blanket. Damn the cold.
He made his way down the ladder into the half-warm, horse-smelling fug of the barn, nearly falling in his haste, ignoring a splinter in his bare foot. He hesitated in the dark, still urgent. The horses wouldn’t care, but if they noticed him, they’d make enough noise, perhaps, to wake the others.
Wind struck the barn and went booming round the roof. A strong chilly draft with a scent of snow stirred the somnolence, and two or three of the horses shifted, grunting and whickering. Overhead, a murmured “‘ugger” drifted down, accompanied by the sound of someone turning over and pulling the blanket up round his ears, defying reality.
Claire was still with him, vivid in his mind, solid in his hands. He could imagine that he smelled her hair in the scent of fresh hay. The memory of her mouth, those sharp white teeth …he rubbed his nipple, hard and itching beneath his shirt, and swallowed.
His eyes were long accustomed to the dark; he found the vacant loose-box at the end of the row and leaned against its boards, cock already in his fist, body and mind yearning for his wife.
He’d have made it last if he could, but he was fearful lest the dream go altogether and he surged into the memory, groaning. His knees gave way in the aftermath and he slid slowly down the boards of the box into the loose piled hay, shirt rucked round his thighs and his heart pounding like a kettle drum.
[end section]
(more stuff in this chapter, of course)
Chapter 2: The Fate of Fuses
London
Argus House
Lord John Grey eyed the ribbon-tied packet on his knee as though it were a bomb. In fact, it couldn’t have been more explosive had it been filled with black powder and equipped with a fuse.
His attitude as he handed it to his brother must have reflected this knowledge, for Hal fixed him with a gimlet eye and raised one brow. He said nothing, though, flicking loose both ribbon and wrapping with an impatient gesture and bending his head at once over the thick sheaf of densely-written sheets that emerged.
Grey couldn’t stand to watch him read through Charles Carruthers’s post-mortem denunciation, recalling each damning page as Hal read it. He stood up and went to the window of the study that looked out into the back garden of Argus House, ignoring the swish of turning pages and the occasional blasphemous mutterings behind him.
Hal’s three boys were playing a game of tigers and hunters, leaping out at each other from behind the shrubbery with shrill roars, followed by shrieks of delight and yells of “Bang! Take that, you striped son of a bitch!”
The nurse seated on the edge of the fish-pool, keeping a tight grip on baby Dottie’s gown, looked up at this, but merely rolled her eyes with a martyred expression. Flesh and blood has its limits, her expression said clearly, and she resumed paddling a hand in the water, luring one of the big goldfish close so that Dottie could drop bits of bread to it.
John longed to be down there with them. It was a rare day for early April, and he felt the pulse of it in his blood, urging him to be outside, running bare-foot through young grass. Running naked down into the water… The sun was high, flooding warm through the glass of the French windows, and he closed his eyes and turned his face up to it.
Siverly. The name floated in the darkness behind his eyes, pasted across the blank face of an imagined cartoon major, drawn in uniform, an outsized sword brandished in his hand, and bags of money stuffed into the back of his breeches, obscene bulges under the skirt of his coat. One or two had fallen to the ground, bursting open so that you could see the contents–coin in one, the other filled with what looked like poppets, small wooden doll-like things. Each one with a tiny knife through its heart.
Hal swore in German behind him. He must have reached the part about the rifles; German oaths were reserved for the most stringent occasions, French being used for minor things like a burnt dinner, and Latin for formal insults committed to paper. Minnie wouldn’t let either Hal or John swear in English in the house, not wanting the boys to acquire low habits. John could have told her it was too late for such caution, but didn’t.
He turned round to see Hal on his feet, pale with rage, a sheet of paper crumpled in one hand.
“How dare he? How dare he?”
A small knot he hadn’t known was there dissolved under John’s ribs.
“You believe Carruthers, then?”
Hal glared at him.
“Don’t you? You knew the man.”
He had known Charles Carruthers–in more than one sense.
“Yes, I believed him when he told me about Siverly in Canada–and that–” he nodded at the papers, thrown in a sprawl across Hal’s desk, “–is even more convincing. You’d think he’d been a lawyer.”
He could still see Carruthers’s face, pale in the dimness of his attic room in [town], drawn with ill-health but set with grim determination to live long enough to see justice done. Charlie hadn’t lived that long, but long enough to write down every detail of the case against Major Gerald Siverly, and to entrust it to him.
He was the fuse that would detonate this particular bomb. And he was all too familiar with what happened to fuses, once lit.
[end section]
Diana – On a completely different note I just watched Thor at the movies yesterday and have to say that Mr Hemsworth would make a delectable Jamie.
I have had the same thought since I saw Thor when it opened! Chris Hemsworth is on the cover of a recent Mens Health magazine and the pics of him inside are beautiful and show his beard and eyebrows are reddish. Nose might not be long enough but his mouth and eyes and his personality on screen are pretty close. He’s 27 and I think he could be vulnerable enough to play the 23 yr old Jamie!
Alifiya,
I felt the same about casting Hensworth (Thor) the moment I saw the trailers on TV!
My husband and I shouted the exact same image at nearly the same moment.
Diana………………take a look at this hunk of a man and see if you agree.
Pam-a-lamb
I vote for the Lord John opening as feel it is a continuation of the Lord John series and thus should take precedence! Thank you for being so generous to your fans! Looking forward to seeing you in Fergus in August!
Lord John, definitely!
Well, I’m sure I wont say anything new, but I didn’t read all the previous reviews, so, here goes. I think that you are definitely right that Jamie’s opening will either make people slam the book shut or run to the register with it. It might be off-putting to those who are unfamiliar with Jamie and Claire’s relationship. John’s opening isn’t quite so exciting or…. whatever the appropriate word is [g], but does have plenty of intrigue. I’m very interested by John’s vision of Siverly and what on earth it means. John’s books are mysteries, and that is a good opening for a mystery novel no doubt. It seems that fairly often that your latest book is the one that caught people’s eye for the first time, and then they went back and read the rest of them. I’m not sure how I would feel about a particular author if the first thing I read of their work was a scene involving masturbation, no matter how well written (and it is very tastefully written, I might add). We know about Jamie, we know that he is half a man without Claire, and we are interested to know the things that happen to him while Claire is Away. But we know about quite a few of those things from the Outlander series. And, I know you said that it is Jamie’s book as much as it is John’s, but it _is_ a Lord John Grey book. I would start with John.
I think you bring up a great point, in that we know how Jamie’s story continues in the Outlander series, even if we are missing a great many details, but the matter that John is dealing with is a complete mystery to us.
My vote is for Jamie first, mostly because I prefer the Outlander series and am eager to hear more about Jamie and Claire. Either way, can’t wait to read the new books coming. Thank you for sharing!
Hola, Diana.
Cuando planteaste la pregunta, lo primero que pensé en frío fue que debería estar primero el capítulo de John, puesto que se trata de su propia serie. Pero luego leí ambos textos y, definitivamente, creo que lo mejor es empezar con Jamie. Dios mío, me destrozó el corazón!!
Lord John apela a la racionalidad, te mete en la intriga y te da una idea de qué va a ir el libro. Pero Jaimie… oh, Jamie te agarra las entrañas, te estruja los sentimientos, te altera las emociones y te hace desear más, todo, no soltar el libro hasta el final, aún sabiendo cómo va a terminar.
Esperaré con ansias que se publique en español. Por cierto, lamento no haberte respondido en inglés, pero temo que hubiera limitado mucho mi expresión. No sé si hablas algo de mi idioma, quizás por tu herencia paterna, pero si no es así siempre quedan los traductores instantáneos.
Éxitos, siempre.
Un caluroso saludo desde Perú!!
I really like the Lord John series a lot, and while I love the boldness of Jamie’s chapter, I think that the first chapter should still belong to Lord John Grey. It is also a strong chapter. And then I think, as a reader, coming to Jamie’s very distinct voice and the subject matter after a chapter with Lord John will still be very touching and provocative. We all love Jamie, but he does have his own series.
Jamie.
I’ve not yet read the LJG series…I hope to, but Jamie and Claire come first for me. I would read The Scottish Prisoner (A LJG novel) most likely before even reading the first LJG novels, only to have a bit more of Jamie’s point of view.
I would assume that there are others who have read the Outlander series who may not have picked up the LJG novels yet either. Choosing Jamie to begin this story would, in my opinion, garner their interest even more so than if it started off strictly as another LJG novel.
And, as I stated the name of the book already, why not begin ‘The Scottish Prisoner’ _with_ the Scottish Prisoner himself?
Also, as someone who’s not familiar with the previous LJG novels, I did not fully comprehend what LJG’s chapter was about. Jamie beginning the tale at least tells me where he is, and at what point in the Outlander novels time-line _this_ book is to take place. Diana is so good at making each book come off as stand alone stories. I did not feel that this one could, starting with LJG’s point of view.
Finally, for me, as I stated above, it’s all about Jamie and Claire for me. With all the books, and with any future books I shall ever read, I will always choose Jamie!
I prefer the Lord John opening.
I have to say that opening with either is perfectly fine with me, though I am a secret admirer of LJ and absolutely LOVE his character. I’m just glad to finally be getting this part of the story. A hundred thousand thank yous for giving us this long-awaited portion of our favorite saga.
Jamie all the way for me !! as much as I do love LJ… Jamie’s scene has more.. wow factor !!!
but I guess you will decide in the end Diana and this is just the teasing you love to give us
Cheers Jo-Anne ( Australia )
Jamie.
I was prepared to think it should start with John, but after some thought, I think the opening with Jamie will draw the reader in immediately, especially since I am quite certain that someone or something is going to enter this scene right about where it now ends. Why Jamie? Well, we now know the book is going to be called Scottish Prisoner and_that_he is so it seems right to start there, with him. Why not John? Honestly, John would work as well. Questions are posed to the reader right away with both, but jumping right in with the prisoner allows the reader to know him and his situation before he is drawn into the mystery with Lord John.
Book ordered and I can’t wait! katmolly
While I love Jamie Fraser as much as most women (and likely many men) who read your books, and that is certainly a titillating opener *cough*, I think you should start with Lord John. He is the title character, after all. I am looking forward to this book! Lord John is in my Top 5 favourite fictional characters of all time.
Lord John – no doubt about that!
I would go with Lord John first. It tracks the way you start the other Lord John books in the series and seems to set up the plot better. I love Jamie and Claire and can’t get enough of them, but I think for this series, it makes more sense to start the book with John. It’ll be a great surprise for your readers when they realize the book is as much about Jamie as it is about John.
I vote Jamie! Great scene that really captures your attention, and a great start for those of us who have a love/hate relationship with John. Either way, I wil definitely be buying the book:)
Hi Diana,
How generous of you to post snips of the two possible opening scenes – you spoil us! I read the Jamie snip when you posted it in the Compuserve forums, and it is heartbreaking. For me, the emotions in that scene would color my reading of what comes next, so for what it’s worth I’m going to vote for the John scene first.
Will you tell us what you ultimately decide, or will we need to wait and see? :o)
John, then Jamie.
Save the power inpact for the finish!
I would go with jamie’s first, as he pulls you in and then you can do john’ss plot starter later. I for one one only kinda like lord john and love the relationship that jamie and clair have for eachother!
Lord John’s opening the book explains more and is safer. I prefer this one, as Jamie’s is so raw and painful…I have my 20 year old daughter reading the series now and we are supporting your finishing book eight asap! The Scottish Prisoner has a space on my bookshelf already waiting.
I vote Lord John to begin, as that would be consistent with the other books in the LJG series and sets up the intrigue.
Each time I begin one of your books I wonder how far in before we get a good sensual scene. Although this is a bit different, having sexual thoughts/actions on the first couple pages is a bit jarring. I like the anticipation of knowing that it’s in there somewhere.