I <3 My Job.

"Oh no you don’t, she thought, after the first flare of anger hit. Magic and weird animals and interdimensional portals freak me out, but snide bullies? That I was dealing with by the time I was thirteen."


This heroine? Is awesome. I did not even know how awesome she was, so she had to remind me.

I may yet finish this draft today. Or she will kick my ass.

In which I tease you about a book, and tease you with a cover…

So this afternoon I finished the book yet-known as Portals #1.  When by "finished" I mean "I hit the last page of the draft but will have to revise it before it goes to Madame Editrix."  So finished good enough to collapse for the weekend. *thuds*

This book was both really hard to write (oh characters, why must you change the story on me mid-stream?) and a lot of fun (there was much mad cackling as dialogue flowed and trouble unfolded), and I hope that y'all enjoy it, too, when it hits the shelves in 2013.  But there's a book that will be out before this one, and even as I was putting the finishing touches on it, I got an email from my editor saying "Look!  I give you a cover!"

And I get to give it to you.

(warning: not final, some details on color, size and text may yet change)

Does it have anything to do with the actual scene in the book?  Well....no.  Not really.  And the artist and I had MASSIVE arguments (via the art director) over the setting (among other things, it's supposed to be set in the northern part of Central Park, near the Harlem Meer and the artist used a bridge in the South end, but, oh, non-New Yorkers won't know the difference anyway.)  And the expression on Bonnie's face is just perfect.  She knows she's just landed herself in a shitload of trouble but she has no. idea. what. it. is. Yet.

And that sky... yeah.

Pretty cover.  *pets the pretty cover*  Dragon Justice isn't blind: it sees everything.

Originally published at Practical Meerkat.  You can comment here, or there.