• “The smartest historical sci-fi adventure-romance story ever written by a science Ph.D. with a background in scripting 'Scrooge McDuck' comics.”—Salon.com
  • A time-hopping, continent-spanning salmagundi of genres.”
    —ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY
  • “These books have to be word-of-mouth books because they're too weird to describe to anybody.”
    —Jackie Cantor, Diana's first editor

“It Could Be Worse”


Social Media Hashtags: #DailyLines, #HappyBirthdaytoFellowGoats !, #TheFIERYCross, #thingscouldbeworse

Cover art for THE FIERY CROSS by Diana GabaldonA grasshopper landed on the canvas above with an audible thump. I eyed it narrowly, but it didn’t seem disposed to come inside, thank goodness. Perhaps I should have accepted Mrs. Bryan’s offer to find me a bed in the house, along with a few other officers’ wives who had accompanied their husbands. Jamie had insisted upon sleeping in the field with his men, though, and I had gone with him, preferring a bed involving Jamie and bugs to one with neither.

I glanced sideways, careful not to move in case he was still asleep. He wasn’t. He was lying quite still, though, utterly relaxed, save for his right hand. He had this raised, and appeared to be examining it closely, turning it to and fro and slowly curling and uncurling his fingers—as well as he could. The fourth finger had a fused joint, and was permanently stiff; the middle finger was slightly twisted, a deep white scar spiraling round the middle joint.

His hand was callused and battered by work, and the tiny stigma of a nail-wound still showed, pale-pink, in the middle of his palm. The skin of his hand was deeply bronzed and weathered, freckled with sun-blots and scattered with bleached gold hairs. I thought it remarkably beautiful.

“Happy birthday,” I said, softly. “Taking stock?”

He let the hand fall on his chest, and turned his head to look at me, smiling.

“Aye, something of the sort. Though I suppose I’ve a few hours left. I was born at half-six; I willna have lived a full half-century until suppertime.”

I laughed and rolled onto my side, kicking the blanket off. The air was still delightfully cool, but it wouldn’t last long.

“Do you expect to disintegrate much further before supper?” I asked, teasing.

“Oh, I dinna suppose anything is likely to fall off by then,” he said, consideringly. “As to the workings… aye, well…” He arched his back, stretching, and sank back with a gratified groan as my hand settled on him.

“It all seems to be in perfect working order,” I assured him. I gave a brief, experimental tug, making him yelp slightly. “Not loose at all.”

“Good,” he said, folding his hand firmly over mine to prevent further unauthorized experiments. “How did ye ken what I was doing? Taking stock, as ye say.”

I let him keep hold of the hand, but shifted to set my chin in the center of his chest, where a small depression seemed made for the purpose.

“I always do that, when I have a birthday—though I generally do it the night before. More looking back, I think, reflecting a bit on the year that’s just gone. But I do check things over; I think perhaps everyone does. Just to see if you’re the same person as the day before.”

“I’m reasonably certain that I am,” he assured me. “Ye dinna see any marked changes, do ye?”

I lifted my chin from its resting place and looked him over carefully. It was in fact rather hard to look at him objectively; I was both so used to his features and so fond of them that I tended to notice tiny, dear things about him—the freckle on his earlobe, the lower incisor pushing eagerly forward, just slightly out of line with its fellows—and to respond to the slightest change of his expression—but not really to look at him as an integrated whole.

He bore my examination tranquilly, eyelids half-lowered against the growing light. His hair had come loose while he slept and feathered over his shoulders, its ruddy waves framing a face strongly marked by both humor and passion—but which possessed a paradoxical and most remarkable capacity for stillness.

“No,” I said at last, and set my chin down again with a contented sigh. “It’s still you.”

He gave a small grunt of amusement, but lay still. I could hear one of the cooks stumbling round nearby, cursing as he tripped over a wagon-tongue. The camp was still in the process of assembling; a few of the companies—those with a high proportion of ex-soldiers among their officers and men—were tidy and organized. A good many were not, and tipsy tents and strewn equipment sprawled across the meadow in a quasi-military hodgepodge.

[omitted stuff about what’s going on with the expedition]

Jamie’s free hand rested on my back, his thumb idly stroking the edge of my shoulder blade. With his usual capacity for mental discipline, he appeared to have dismissed the uncertainty of the military prospects completely from his mind, and was thinking of something else entirely.

“Do ye ever think—” he began, and then broke off.

“Think what?” I bent and kissed his chest, arching my back to encourage him to rub it, which he did.

“Well… I’m no so sure I can explain, but it’s struck me that now I have lived longer than my father did—which is not something I expected to happen,” he added, with faint wryness. “It’s only… well, it seems odd, is all. I only wondered, did ye ever think of that, yourself—having lost your mother young, I mean?”

“Yes.” My face was buried in his chest, my voice muffled in the folds of his shirt. “I used to—when I was younger. Like going on a journey without a map.”

His hand on my back paused for a moment.

“Aye, that’s it.” He sounded a little surprised. “I kent more or less what it would be like to be a man of thirty, or of forty—but now what?” His chest moved briefly, with a small noise that might have been a mixture of amusement and puzzlement.

“You invent yourself,” I said softly, to the shadows inside the hair that had fallen over my face. “You look at other women—or men; you try on their lives for size. You take what you can use, and you look inside yourself for what you can’t find elsewhere. And always… always… you wonder if you’re doing it right.”

His hand was warm and heavy on my back. He felt the tears that ran unexpectedly from the corners of my eyes to dampen his shirt, and his other hand came up to touch my head and smooth my hair.

“Aye, that’s it,” he said again, very softly.

The camp was beginning to stir outside, with clangings and thumps, and the hoarse sound of sleep-rough voices. Overhead, the grasshopper began to chirp, the sound like someone scratching a nail on a copper pot.

“This is a morning my father never saw,” Jamie said, still so softly that I heard it as much through the walls of his chest, as with my ears. “The world and each day in it is a gift, mo chride— no matter what tomorrow may be.”

I sighed deeply and turned my head, to rest my cheek against his chest. He reached over gently and wiped my nose with a fold of his shirt.

“And as for taking stock,” he added practically, “I’ve all my teeth, none of my parts are missing, and my cock still stands up by itself in the morning. It could be worse.”



This excerpt from THE FIERY CROSS is Copyright © by Diana Gabaldon, all rights reserved. It was also posted on my official Facebook page on January 11, 2019.

About reposting my excerpts (aka “Daily Lines”) from any of my books and short fiction, I’d appreciate it very much if you would NOT copy my them (word for word—in part or in their entirety) and post the text yourself all over the internet (including web pages and social media accounts) or anywhere else. These are copyrighted works. Instead, please do pass on the links (aka “URLs”) to my website and specific excerpts to anyone you think might be interested.

Best Wishes… and Sad News


Diana's dogs napping on a pillow.My best wishes for a good New Year to everybody.

I’m sorry that I have to begin the year myself with bad news; my lovely dog JJ died this afternoon (complications from a freak accident he suffered two weeks ago) and we buried him next to my garden, where he loved to hunt rabbits and toads with his brother, Homer.

Homer is bereft and so are we.

-Diana

In the upper-right image, JJ and Homer take a nap together. In the next photo, JJ looks for critters to chase in a prickly pear cactus:

Diana's dog JJ and a prickly pear.

familystuff-020-2

In the photo below, JJ and Homer were not sure of a visitor in 2012 and tried to hide:

Homer-and-JJ-under-table

The Fourth Sunday of Advent!


4th-Sunday-advent-DianaGabaldonIt’s a short Advent season this year, Christmas coming so soon after the Fourth Sunday, but we are the more expectant in our anticipation, and deeper in our gratitude for the blessings of home and family.

May the blessings of the season be with you and yours!

This excerpt is from the end of THE SCOTTISH PRISONER (aka DIE FACKELN DER FREIHEIT, in German).

Social Media Hashtags: #DailyLines, #FourthSundayofAdvent, #Rejoice

It was cold in the loft, and his sleep-mazed mind groped among the icy drafts after the words still ringing in his mind.

“Bonnie lad.”

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 below, grunting and whickering. Helwater. The knowledge of the place settled on him, and the fragments of Scotland and Lallybroch cracked and flaked away, fragile as a skin of dried mud.

Helwater. Straw rustling under him, the ends poking through the rough ticking, prickling through his shirt. Dark air, alive around him.

Bonnie lad…

They’d brought down the Yule log to the house that afternoon, all the household taking part, the women bundled to the eyebrows, the men ruddy, flushed with the labor, staggering, singing, dragging the monstrous log with ropes, its rough skin packed with snow, a great furrow left where it passed, the snow plowed high on either side.

Willie rode atop the log, screeching with excitement, clinging to the rope. Once back at the house, Isobel had tried to teach him to sing “Good King Wenceslaus,” but it was beyond him, and he dashed to and fro, into everything until his grandmother declared that he would drive her to distraction and told Peggy to take him to the stable, to help Jamie and Crusoe bring in the fresh-cut branches of pine and fir. Thrilled, Willie rode on Jamie’s saddle-bow to the grove, and stood obediently on a stump where Jamie had put him, safe out of the way of the axes while the boughs were cut down. Then he helped to load the greenery, clutching two or three fragrant, mangled twigs to his chest, dutifully chucking these in the general direction of the huge basket, then running back again for more, heedless of where his burden had actually landed.

Jamie turned over, wriggling deeper into the nest of blankets, drowsy, remembering. He’d kept it up, the wean had, back and forth, back and forth, though red in the face and panting, until he dropped the very last branch on the pile. Jamie had looked down to find Willie beaming up at him with pride, laughed and said on impulse, “Aye, that’s a bonnie lad. Come on. Let’s go home.”

William had fallen asleep on the ride home, his head heavy as a cannonball in its woolen cap against Jamie’s chest. Jamie had dismounted carefully, holding the child in one arm, but Willie had wakened, blinked groggily at Jamie and said, “WEN-sess-loss,” clear as a bell, then fallen promptly back asleep. He’d waked properly by the time he was handed over to Nanny Elspeth, though, and Jamie had heard him, as he walked away, telling Nanny, “I’m a bonnie lad!”

But those words came out of his dreams, from somewhere else, and long ago. Had his own father said that to him, once?

He thought so, and for an instant—just an instant—was with his father and his brother Willie, excited beyond bearing, holding the first fish he’d ever caught by himself, slimy and flapping, both of them laughing at him, with him in joy.

“Bonnie lad!”

Willie. God, Willie. I’m so glad they gave him your name. He seldom thought of his brother; Willie had died of the smallpox when he was eleven, Jamie, eight. But every now and then, he could feel Willie with him, sometimes his mother or his father. More often, Claire.

I wish ye could see him, Sassenach, he thought. He’s a bonnie lad. Loud and obnoxious, he added with honesty, but bonnie.

What would his own parents think of William? They had neither of them lived to see any of their children’s children.

He lay for some time, his throat aching, listening to the dark, hearing the voices of his dead pass by in the wind. His thoughts grew vague and his grief eased, comforted by the knowledge of love, still alive in the world. Sleep came near again.

He touched the rough crucifix that lay against his chest and whispered to the moving air, “Lord, that she might be safe; she and my children.”

Then turned his cheek to her reaching hand and touched her through the veils of time.

[end section]


Want to read more? Click here for my “Fourth Sunday of Advent” blog from 2012, which features an excerpt from WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART’S BLODD.


Copyright © 2018 and © 2011 by Diana Gabaldon. All Rights Reserved.

Please do not copy and paste this text and post it anywhere else including other websites and social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, etc.).

If you’d like to share this passage with others, please copy and paste—and share—this link (URL, text version):

http://www.dianagabaldon.com/2018/12/fourth-sunday-of-advent/

Thanks!

-Diana


The Third Sunday of Advent


This is the Third Sunday of Advent, when we pause in our serious reflections and take thought and give thanks for the happiness in our lives and souls and the approaching hope and joy of Christmas. This Sunday is also called “Gaudete Sunday,” which means “Rejoicing Sunday.”

(And to add to our sense of rejoicing, a Youtube video of Michael McGlynn’s most recent arrangement/performance of “Gaudete (Christus est natus),” one of my favorite pieces of Christmas music.)

Social Media Hashtags: #DailyLines, #ThirdSundayofAdvent, #Rejoice, #ExcerptFromTheFieryCross

2018-ThirdSundayAdvent-GabaldonWE WERE LUCKY. The rain held off, and shredding clouds revealed a silver moon, rising lopsided but luminous over the slope of Black Mountain; suitable illumination for an intimate family wedding.

I had met David Caldwell, though I hadn’t recalled it until I saw him; a small but immensely personable gentleman, very tidy in his dress, despite camping in the open for a week. Jamie knew him, too, and respected him. That didn’t prevent a certain tightness of expression as the minister came into the firelight, his worn prayer book clasped in his hands, but I nudged Jamie warningly, and he at once altered his expression to one of inscrutability. I saw Roger glance once in our direction, then turn back to Bree. There might have been a slight smile at the corner of his mouth, or it could have been only the effect of the shadows. Jamie exhaled strongly through his nose, and I nudged him again.

“You had your way over the baptism,” I whispered. He lifted his chin slightly. Brianna glanced in our direction, looking slightly anxious.

“I havena said a word, have I?”

“It’s a perfectly respectable Christian marriage.”

“Did I say it was not?”

“Then look happy, damn you!” I hissed. He exhaled once more, and assumed an expression of benevolence one degree short of outright imbecility.

“Better?” he asked, teeth clenched in a genial smile. I saw Duncan Innes turn casually toward us, start, and turn hastily away, murmuring something to Jocasta, who stood near the fire, white hair shining, and a blindfold over her damaged eyes to shield them from the light. Ulysses, standing behind her, had in fact put on his wig in honor of the ceremony; it was all I could see of him in the darkness, hanging apparently disembodied in the air above her shoulder. As I watched, it turned sideways, toward us, and I caught the faint shine of eyes beneath it.

“Who that, Grand-mère?” Germain, escaped as usual from parental custody, popped up near my feet, pointing curiously at the Reverend Caldwell.

“That’s a minister, darling. Auntie Bree and Uncle Roger are getting married.”

“Ou qu’on va minster?” I drew a deep breath, but Jamie beat me to it.

“It’s a sort of priest, but not a proper priest.”

“Bad priest?” Germain viewed the Reverend Caldwell with substantially more interest.

“No, no,” I said. “He’s not a bad priest at all. It’s only that… well, you see, we’re Catholics, and Catholics have priests, but Uncle Roger is a Presbyterian—”

“That’s a heretic,” Jamie put in helpfully.

“It is not a heretic, darling, Grand-père is being funny—or thinks he is. Presbyterians are…” Germain was paying no attention to my explanation, but instead had tilted his head back, viewing Jamie with fascination.

“Why Grand-père is making faces?”

“We’re verra happy,” Jamie explained, expression still fixed in a rictus of amiability.

“Oh.” Germain at once stretched his own extraordinarily mobile face into a crude facsimile of the same expression—a jack-o’-lantern grin, teeth clenched and eyes popping. “Like this?”

“Yes, darling,” I said, in a marked tone. “Just like that.”

Marsali looked at us, blinked, and tugged at Fergus’s sleeve. He turned, squinting at us.

“Look happy, Papa!” Germain pointed to his gigantic smile. “See?”

Fergus’s mouth twitched, as he glanced from his offspring to Jamie. His face went blank for a moment, then adjusted itself into an enormous smile of white-toothed insincerity. Marsali kicked him in the ankle. He winced, but the smile didn’t waver.

Brianna and Roger were having a last-minute conference with Reverend Caldwell, on the other side of the fire. Brianna turned from this, brushing back her loose hair, saw the phalanx of grinning faces, and stared, her mouth slightly open. Her eyes went to me; I shrugged helplessly.

Her lips pressed tight together, but curved upward irrepressibly. Her shoulders shook with suppressed laughter. I felt Jamie quiver next to me.

Reverend Caldwell stepped forward, a finger in his book at the proper place, put his spectacles on his nose, and smiled genially at the assemblage, blinking only slightly when he encountered the row of leering countenances.

He coughed, and opened his Book of Common Worship.

“Dearly beloved, we are assembled here in the presence of God…”


Copyright © by Diana Gabaldon. All Rights Reserved.

Please do not copy and paste this text and post it anywhere else including other websites and social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, etc.).

If you’d like to share this passage with others, please copy and paste—and share—this link (URL, text version):

http://www.dianagabaldon.com/2018/12/the-third-sunday-of-advent-2/

Thanks!

-Diana


Days of the Dead…


Diana's Jack-o-LanternSocial Media Hashtags: #DailyLines, #Prologue, #MasterRaymondsBook, #NOitisntwrittenyet, #HappyHALLOWEEN

In the chilly season, when the air grows cold and the spiders die, comes a thin time. The days are short, so all the light of them is concentrated, squeezed between the dawn and dark. This is why the light is different, and each thing has a Shadow. This is when the other worlds draw close, and the barriers between grow thin. In a thin time, they say, you must be careful, because you might walk through a cobweb unthinking, and find yourself Elsewhere.

There is more than one other world; no one knows how many. Some beasts can see one; the dogs will sometimes stare at a blank space on the wall of a cave, and their hackles rise at what they see.

Sometimes, I think I see it, too.


Los Dias de los Muertos

Lit candleIn the Southwest, for those of us of Hispanic descent (or inclination), today and tomorrow are Los Dias de los Muertos—the Days of the Dead.

Today (Nov. 1) we celebrated the presence in our lives of those who’ve gone before and await us in heaven; the Feast of All Saints. Tomorrow (Nov. 2) is the Feast of All Souls, when we commune with our own beloved dead.

May all your own families be with you in love today, no matter on which side of the veil.


From November 2, 2018. Also posted on my official Facebook page.

What a week it’s been!


Tuesday, October 23, 2018

2018-10-Roses-PBS-Read-ResultsMAN, what a week it’s been! First off, let me thank ALL of you who did such great work, voting in the PBS “Great American Read” program. I know a lot of you voted day after day, and often multiple times a day; I appreciate that HUGELY—and your votes were not in vain!

PBS filmed the finale on Sunday night (swearing the audience to secrecy, which apparently worked; I didn’t see any leaks), but aired it this evening (Tuesday). It was an interesting format: they invited a number of authors from nominated books to come and introduce segments of the list (with light running commentary)—by “segments,“ I mean they had two writers count down the list from the book that ended up in 100th place, to the book that was #81. Then they did a video about one or another of the five finalist books, shuffled their screen of intriguing book-covers, and called up the next set of authors to comment on books 80-61, and so on.

When they got to the last (or first, depending how you want to look at it) ten books, they counted down to the final five, then called the representatives of those books out on stage for the final countdown. I say “representatives,” because the authors of three of the finalists are dead, and J.K. Rowling, who was in the list, wasn’t there. I was the only author representing my own book. <g>

If you’d like to watch the finale episode yourself, here’s a link to it:

https://www.pbs.org/video/grand-finale-q4ij7z/

But for those who don’t want to sit through the suspense <g>—OUTLANDER came in second, behind TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (the PBS people noted that MOCKINGBIRD had been #1 on the list from the very first day of voting, and never wavered from that position).

Personally, I was thrilled—we beat PRIDE AND PREJUDICE, LORD OF THE RINGS (!!) and HARRY POTTER! TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is a great classic, a wonderful read—and a book that means a lot to a great number of people in the current political climate, owing to its themes of racial and social justice. It totally deserved to win.

Besides, as my lovely editor said in an email to me this morning (retrieved in JFK airport on my way home),

“You are officially the most beloved living writer! … We are so thrilled and proud to be your publisher!”

I’m thrilled and proud to have the support of a great publisher—but most of all, to have the support of so many wonderful readers! MORAN TAING! (that’s “Thanks a lot” in Gaelic)

And if you’d like to see the final results of the “Great American Read”here’s the complete list:

https://www.pbs.org/the-great-american-read/results/

-Diana

PBSGreatAmericanReadLogo

NYCC This Weekend…


nycc-logo-colorAnybody going to New York Comic Con this weekend? If so…

Come by and see me! NYCC has invited me to participate on a panel called “Pages to Pictures”—to do with adaptation, screen-writing, etc. this will be at 10:00 a.m. on SUNDAY, October 7th, at the Shop Studio location.

The panel will be FOLLOWED BY a signing event at the Penguin Random House booth in the Javits Center, from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m..

I’ll put up room/hall numbers for you tomorrow—at the moment, I’m at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Which is wonderful, dramatic, utterly lacking in WiFi (I’m writing this on my iPad in a general store at the nearby campground) and Utterly Wretched phone reception.

See you in New York!

-Diana

P.S.: My Webmistress, Loretta, says sorry, but all entry badges to NYCC are already sold out. She has written up some pointers for those attending a large comic-con like this one for the first time in the NYCC entry on my official appearances page.

My future events are also listed on my official appearances webpage as they are confirmed:

http://www.dianagabaldon.com/appearances

Reminder – Great American Read (PBS)!


Rosie The Riveter and the Great American ReadWell, alrighty, then… So, the voting for your favorite book(s) in the PBS “Great American Read” series goes on until October 19th! That’s a whole lot of voting, and I hesitate to urge anybody to DO it every day…. but I feel that I should tell you that you can if you want to. <g>

You can vote for as many of your favorite books as you want, every day. But—

You can vote ONCE PER DAY PER VOTING METHOD for any given book. (So you could vote five times per day for any given book(s), though I must say that sounds like a lot of trouble…)

As for HOW you can vote… the many possibilities make my head swim. Choose your favorite(s):

Method 1: Voting Using Social Media (Your Facebook and Twitter Accounts)

An easy way to vote for my OUTLANDER series (if you use Facebook and/or Twitter) is to create an original Facebook post (on my Facebook page, your Facebook page, or anywhere else on Facebook) that includes the hashtag:

#VOTEOutlander

You can do the same thing via Twitter—just add #VOTEOutlander to one of your tweets that day for another vote.

(Note that if you don’t have a Facebook and/or Twitter account, you cannot use these voting methods.)

Click here for a list of hashtags for all of the 100 book finalists (PDF format).


Method 2: Text Message (SMS) Voting

Uncle-Sam-GrAmReadPBSSend a Text Message (SMS) to 97979 with a unique hashtag for your favorite book in the message. For OUTLANDER, it is:

#VOTEOutlander

Click here for a list of hashtags for all of the 100 book finalists (PDF format).


Method 3: Phone Voting

Each of the 100 finalist books in the Great American Read has an assigned toll-free number.

To vote for OUTLANDER, dial (855) 443-6574 (U.S.A., U.S. territories, and Canada only).


Method 4: Vote On The PBS Great American Read Website:

Visit the PBS voting webpage for the Great American Read where you can vote for multiple favorite books each day by pointing and clicking. (You will need to log in to the PBS website to vote using your account, by email address, or using your Facebook account login).

In your web browser application, go to:

https://www.pbs.org/the-great-american-read/vote/

Scroll down and click on a book, such as OUTLANDER, and select all your favorites.

Note that after choosing your favorite book(s) you must click the Confirm button for your votes to be submitted and counted. You will asked to log in if you haven’t already.


Information on all the ways you can vote is on the PBS website at:

https://www.pbs.org/the-great-american-read/about/how-to-vote/

AND THANK YOU VERY MUCH INDEED!!!

-Diana


Yankees – First Pitch!


A Big Honor

September 14, 2018

2018-09-14-Diana-warming-up Life gets weirder by the minute—but in a GOOD way! Today I was honored to throw the first pitch at the Yankees game. (They beat the Toronto Blue Jays 11 to 0 in Yankee Stadium in the Bronx.)

Thanks, Yankees! It was the thrill of a lifetime!

From the celebratory wine:

“Growing up in distant Arizona, without a hometown team to follow, young Diana dreamed of one day playing for the Yankees. As the years passed, she dabbled in different fields: marine biology, zoology, hoping the phone would ring. Finally, with the playoffs in sight, Gabaldon was called up to anchor the bullpen. Joined by family and friends, Diana tossed out the first pitch for the New York Yankees.”

first-pitch-wine-DG

DG-Yankees-twitter


Photos on this blog post by Diana Gabaldon and her husband, Doug.

SEVEN STONES In Trade Paperback!


Good News!

US-cover-SEVEN-STONES-tpbThe good news for today (every day has at least some…) is that SEVEN STONES TO STAND OR FALL is now available in trade paperback format (that’s the large size paperback) in the U.S. and Canada! (It’s already out in the U.K., Australia and New Zealand.) The yellow cover is U.S./Canada; the blue cover is U.K./Australia/N.Z.

If you haven’t come across this book yet—here’s a bit from the Introduction.

Introduction to SEVEN STONES (Excerpt):

If you picked this book up under the misapprehension that it’s the ninth novel in the main Outlander series, it’s not. I apologize.

So, if it’s not the ninth novel, what is it? Well, it’s a collection of seven…. er…. things, of varying length and content, but all having to do with the Outlander universe. As for the title… basically, it’s the result of my editor not liking my original title choice, Salmagundi. Not that I couldn’t see her point… Anyway, there was a polite request via my agent for something more in line with the “resonant, poetic” nature of the main titles.

Without going too much into the mental process that led to this (words like “sausage-making” and “rock-polishing” come to mind), I wanted a title that at least suggested that there were a number of elements in this book (hence the “Seven”) and “Seven Stones” just came naturally, and that was nice (“stone” is always a weighty word) and suitably alliterative, but not a complete poetic thought (or rhythm). So, a bit more thinkering (no, that’s not a typo), and I came up with “to Stand or Fall,” which sounded suitably portentous.

UK-Seven-Stones-tpbIt took a bit of ex post facto thought to figure out what the heck that meant, but things usually do mean something if you think long enough. In this instance, the “stand or fall” has to do with people’s response to grief and adversity: to wit, if you aren’t killed outright by whatever happened, you have a choice in how the rest of your life is lived—you keep standing, though battered and worn by time and elements, still a buttress and a signpost…. or you fall and return quietly to the earth from which you sprang, your elements giving succor to those who come after you.

So. This is (as the front cover suggests) a collection of seven novellas (fiction shorter than a novel but longer than a short story), though all of them are indeed part of the Outlander universe and do intersect with the main novels.

Five of the novellas included in this book were originally written for various anthologies over the last few years; two are brand-new and have never been published before: “A Fugitive Green” and “Besieged.”

Owing to differences among publishers in different countries, some of the previously published novellas may subsequently have been published in print form as a four-story collection (in the U.K. and Germany), or as separate ebooks (in the U.S.). Seven Stones provides a complete print collection for those readers who like tactile books, and includes the two new stories. (“A Fugitive Green” and “Besieged” will eventually be published separately as ebooks in the U.S., too, for those who prefer that mode of reading, but it might be awhile.)


Buy-Links:

If you’re interested, here are some buy-links for SEVEN STONES:

Or check out my SEVEN STONES webpage for more buy-links and information. Thanks!


This post also appeared on my official Facebook page on August 7, 2018.