Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I had a great one. We went down to Delta and visited my family, got to hang out, shoot the bull, eat lots of stuff, and my kids were able to play with cows and cousins.   I love Thanksgiving, and as far as being thankful, my family has been extremely blessed this year.

And right now, I am very full of pie. So very full. So much pie… 

On the writing update bit, I can now say that you will see the following Larry Correia books come out from Baen, in this order:

Monster Hunter International

Monster Hunter Vendetta (told by Owen Z. Pitt)

Monster Hunter Alpha (an Earl Harbinger novel)

The Grimnoir Chronicles: Hard Magic

Monster Hunter ? (told by Owen Z. Pitt)

MHV will be out next year, I don’t have an official date. Then Alpha after that. Then TGC, probably in 2011. Then the next MH Owen novel shortly after TGC #1.  MHV is done. MHA is in progress. TGC:HM is done. MH? is in early scripting.  I’ve got a lot of writing to do. 

Toni really liked TGC. Which made my day. I was a little worried about this one, as it is a very different book than MHI, and I also suck at pitching ideas.  I do believe you guys will love this series though. For my MHI fans, it isn’t monstery, but it is magical, and hence there are beasties that pop up. In this case I’ve got the Summoned and a very different take on the undead.  For my gunny readers, I’ve got tons of period goodness. BARs, 1911s, Lewis guns, Thompsons, and a bunch of things that I made up.  This is the era of blue steel and walnut. And John Browning is in it.  And for readers in general, it is just a great story. 

On the leather bound hard covers, those are still a definite maybe, but will not be happening anytime soon, and certainly not this year.  I still want to persue a run though.

Also, I don’t know where this came from, as I’ve been hanging out in the top 10,000 on Amazon for the last couple of months, but I saw this today. 

Talk about a Happy Thanksgiving!  Boo Yah. That’s the highest I’ve been in months, and I have no idea why. Unless you guys actually went for my MHI for Christmas post.  🙂

Oh, and for the orders that have been coming in, I just ran out of patches, but should have more here any day now. So if you ordered a patch recently, you’ll probably have to wait another week. I’m trying to get some in before I go to Denver.

Hmmm…. I wonder if there is any more apple pie left?

John Brown and I will be doing two signings on December 5th in the Denver area:  http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/author-events/Larry-Correia/2166155

…Keeps on giving me royalites that is! Bwa HA HA HA!! 

Okay, sorry, my inner capitalist was coming out there.  Now I’m assuming that everyone that reads this blog already has a copy of MHI or 5, but I was just thinking… (dangerous, I know), that MHI is the perfect Christmas present!

Hear me out.  I think that all of my regular readers need to go buy more copies of Monster Hunter International to give as Christmas presents. Here is why:

1. It is relatively cheap.  – Think about it. The cover price is only $7.99.  That is the perfect price point for those people that you feel like you should give presents to, but that you don’t like enough to spend real money on.  These are the people that you usually end up giving cheese logs or Hillshire Farms mystery meat sticks.  MHI has all the joy of giving, with half the cholesterol.

Now keep in mind, you can’t really go cheaper. If you were to give them something that cost $5, you’d seem like a miserable cheap bastard. Why don’t you just push them down while you’re at it?  Scrooge.  

2. It makes the person getting it feel real smart. – Yes. Because you would never give a book to somebody who was really dumb. They’d probably just try to eat it or something.  Not only can you make that certain somebody whose name you drew out of the office Secret Santa pool feel like a member of the literati, you can also be known as the kind of extra smart person who gives the gift of words.  “Yes, Jim, when I drew your name out of that puffy trucker hat, I knew that you were so smart that you’d need a book. But not just any book, but one thick with learning. Crap, look at the size of that friggin’ thing. You’d have to be like Einstein or something to get through that pig!”

3. The perfect gift for people who shoot stuff for fun. – Now for the seven of you who read this blog who aren’t gun people, you probably have a gun person on your Christmas list. Sure, you would like to give them something that they’d love, but remember what happened last year?  When he told you that what he really wanted was a 8.72 x 34mm Mannlicher Gustav Crimp Adjuster Sling with Lebel Tactical Larynard and you went to the Cabelas and wandered cluelessly for five hours before giving up and buying them a camoflage cozy to keep their beer cold?  Yeah… he remembers it too. He remembers it with a bitter hate that will not die. But you can avoid that this year by giving the gift that all gun people love. The gift of shooting monsters in the face!

4. For every 500 copies of MHI sold, the author can afford another case of ammo. – Have you priced .223 lately? I mean seriously. It is brutal.

5. Signed copies show that you care – Now for that dude at the office who you feel obligated to give a gift to because he gave you a cheese ball last year, (Smokey Bacon flavor… yum) For that guy you can just get a regular copy off of Amazon. But for that special person who would really savor the hours of enjoyment that only monster killing can bring, you can show them that you really care by getting a signed copy.  At the top of this page is the ultra handy Buy Stuff tab with the instructions on how to get an autographed copy.

You can then revel in the sheer awesomeness as your chosen giftee unwraps their package, and says “Wow! A book! Look somebody drew in it. Is that supposed to be a lightning bolt? What a crappy happy face. Was this drawn by an inmate from the insane asylum?” And if they say that, you have my permission to scissor kick them in the neck, because I have a perfectly fine signature.

So there you go. Five reasons to give the gift of Monster Hunter International this holiday season.  It isn’t just limited to Christmas either. Nothing says Hanukah like MHI. Heck, everyone knows Kwanzaa is all about celebrating the defeat of the Elder Things. (I think, but I’m a little fuzzy on my Kwanzaa history). 

Now if you will excuse me, I’ve got to continue working on The Christmas Noun II. The Bloodening.

I’m back from Arizona.  We were only there for 2 days, but we managed to do two events, visit 23 stores, sign a lot of books, meet a lot of people, and then go out for BBQ.

John put together an area map and then numbered every store in the Phoenix metro area. Then we unleashed the power of the Tom Tom and set out.  Store. Store. Store. Eat. Visit. Store. Store. Store.  Sign. Eat. Non stop for two days!  It was awesome. I’ve gone to other states before, but I’ve never gotten this much done.

Borders has got to be hurting.  Visiting that many stores that quickly was very enlightening.  Every single Borders was dissapointing.

You go into a B&N. It is well lit, well stocked, the staff is friendly and knowledgable. You ask who their fantasy readers are on staff and everyone else automatically knows.  They’re excited to have you sign the stock.  I was either in stock at every B&N, or they could look on the computer and tell me that they’d just sold out and had more coming. Most stores had 2-4 copies, with plans to reorder 4-8 more.  A few stores told me that if they’d known 2 weeks ago that I was coming they would have ordered in lots of extra copies for me to sign, because in their words “Signed copies make anything easier to sell!”

You go into a Borders. The staff doesn’t seem as happy. If my book is in stock, they have a single copy. Or their computer shows that they have a copy in stock, but they can’t find it.  A few of them were downright dreary, with the lights all dim and depressing.  In one store I walked up to a group of managers, introduced myself, and asked if I could sign the stock.  One manager quickly warned me not to sign them all, because “If they’re signed, then we can’t return them!”

I looked at the guy for a second, trying to wrap my brain around that. “Uhmm… I’ve been out for five months, I’ve been on two best seller lists, and I’m on my third printing. It isn’t exactly a hard sell.”  

Okay… I’m not just speaking as an author, I’m speaking as someone who’s been a small businessman and who has run a retail establishment… if your sales strategy is based on managing inevitable failure, you’ve got issues. No wonder the staff never seemed as happy.  That has got to be a tough corporate culture.  “Welcome to Borders, sigh. No, we don’t have that, and if we did, we’d probably just have to return it anyway.”

We were able to meet with fans a couple of times, and I had dinner with the guys from WTA, the Gun Counter, the Anarchangel and Smallest Minority. I think John was impressed that my readers aren’t just heavily armed red-staters, but we are philosophical heavily armed red-staters who can discuss literature and complex political issues.  Plus, my people bring gifts of t-shirts, unit patches, can openers, and Cav Arms plastic stabby knives.  I love my people.

John was talking about his book at one of the B&Ns. He got to the part about how in his world, humans are being ranched.  A bug eyed crazy guy says “It is true! Lizard people are ranching us! IT’S TRUE!!!!”  He was totally serious.  John figured that my audience was made up of the well-armed gentlemen who could have profound discussions on the nature of human liberty and his audience was the guy off his meds. Sadly by pointing this out I’ve doomed this prophet of truth, as now the Reptoids know that someone in Arizona is on to them. 

We had a discussion and signing at the Poison Pen in Scottsdale. It was a great shop, and our hosts were awesome. I think we drew a larger crowd than they were expecting. We had a great time.  It turned out that Michael Stackpole was in the audience too.  I didn’t know that until the end. It was nice to hear somebody who’s written a lot of books say that for being new guys, John and I had a clue. 

It was kind of fun to be doing this trip in the immediate aftermath of Brandon Sanderson’s Wheel Of Time Mega-Tour. There were a few stores we went into where they had a giant stack of his books, and one of us would say that we were friends of Brandon’s. 

Bookstore Clerk: “OH MY GAWD! YOU KNOW #1 BEST SELLER BRANDON!!! AAAAAHHHHH!”  

“Yeah, you know his Podcast?  John and I have both co-hosted on there… It’s not a big deal.  There aren’t that many fantasy writers in Utah so we all know each other.”  

“BRAAANDON SANDERSON IS SOOOOO COOOOOOL!!!!” 

Oh my friggin’ hell. It was like telling people I hang out with Aerosmith, Tiger Woods, and the Queen of England.  The only other way to get that kind of reaction out of store clerks was to tell them that my book was the “Anti-Twilight.”  Then the clerk would usually mutter something incredibly bitter about fourteen year old girls and then buy a copy of MHI for themselves.

Here was John’s take on the trip: http://johndbrown.com/2009/11/poisoned-pen-concealed-carriers-and-crazies/

Next up is Denver the first week of December, then I’m done for a bit. I still have several other places that want me to come, but I need a few weekends that don’t involve flying. (on that same note, my Southwest experience is beating Delta pretty handily).

Come and say hi tomorrow: