Caitlín R. Kiernan

On this day, two years ago, I found THE END of Daughter of Hounds. And now, here I am trying to find the beginning of the next novel, Joey Lafaye.

No writing yesterday, but a lot of figuring out what is to be written. I know now that the book will be set in Athens, Georgia, though I really wanted to set it in New England. This will be my last novel set in the South. Whatever I have left to say about the South, I will say it in this novel. Also, I discovered that the name of one of my two main characters Addison Lynch (the other protagonist is the epynonymous Joey Lafayette). She lives with her paternal aunt, Violet Lynch, who goes by Vi. Also, I decided that the novel will be told alternately in first and third person, with Addison's (Addie) chapters delivered as fpn and Joey's as tpn. There will be no prologue. There will be the fairy carnival, which includes Sweet William and Ignatius, Snapdragon and her clairvoyant mother (whom I have not yet named), the Barker, the Ravens Four, the Sweetgum Beastie, and a woman who is also an owl. Addie Lynch makes dolls.

I hope to begin Chapter One today.

Last night, Spooky made spaghetti, and then we watched Sidney Lumet's 1957 adaptation of Reginald Rose's 12 Angry Men on TMC, because Spooky had never seen it. And also because it's a truly superb film, and also because, along with Stanley Kramer's Inherit the Wind (1960), 12 Angry Men was one of those films that helped awaken me to the importance of critical thought in all aspects of life when, as a preteen, I was still mired in the stultifying dogmas of Xtianity. Afterwards, we spent some time in Second Life, in New Babbage, and watched the Vernian Sea rise, yet another consequence of the Great Upheaval, and then the Professor used her Temporal Teleportation Cabinet to restore Miss Artemisia Paine — recently rendered ten or eleven years of age by a diabolical merry-go-round — to her usual adult self again. It looks like New Babbage will be snowed in until at least the end of December, so it's a good thing we have all that steam.

I need to go to the library at Emory University, but not today. I need to begin Sirenia Digest #24, but not today.

And before anything more, there must be coffee...