Go read this interview with Juliet Ulman, my awesome editor, conducted by Matthew Cheney for Fantasy magazine. The whole thing is fascinating, but if you're, like, a relative who's only interested in such things as they pertain to me, here's part of what she said when asked what she's working on now: "I'm also in the midst of the first in Tim Pratt's new urban fantasy series, a really fun magic-based adventure called Blood Engines -- definitely not your same old vampires+werewolves+sex number." Yes indeed. I have no plans to incorporate werewolves or vampires into that series, either. (There is a guy who turns into a bear in Blood Engines, but it's more shamanistic than lycanthropic.)

When we got home today, our Xmas tree was horizontal, with candy canes scattered all over the floor. We have rowdy cats. That's why we don't have a real tree. (Also, dragging a real tree up three flights of stairs and through our narrow-ass stairwell would be no fun.) The cats managed to break part of the tree stand, too. What makes this even more impressive is that the whole tree was lashed down with several bungee cords, expressly to prevent the cats from knocking it over. I think all three cats must have jumped into the branches and worked as a team to pull it down. They oughta become loggers.

Gah. They canceled Day Break after six episodes! The only reason I let myself watch that show at all was because I'd heard it was a mini-series with 13 episodes already completed, which would tell a complete self-contained story. Because I wouldn't be strung along! And now -- truncated halfway through the story! The ratings were abysmal, and, hell, I can see why -- it's hard to follow if you haven't watched from the beginning. And, more damning from a dramatic point of view, it's a time-loop story, so there's no dramatic tension when characters are threatened or killed. Major characters die often, but they're always alive again the next morning, so it doesn't really matter. The only one who takes physical damage that carries over from day to day is the protagonist, and there's not tension about his death, either -- we know he'll live, at least until the final episode, because he's the protagonist. I'm not actually bothered by the lack of dramatic tension on that score -- I watch it for the mystery unwinding, and the way the protag's perceptions change -- but I can see why it might not connect with most viewers. There's a chance the remaining episodes will air online, and there's always hope for a DVD collecting all the episodes. But I was really into that show. Apparently I was one of the few. Sigh.