Dictation by Fireball5485

2010 Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego on April 9th youtube videos
    Part 1

Intro: I don’t know why you’re applauding.

{Jim Laughs} I haven’t even done anything yet.

Is it on?

There, how’s that? Can you guys hear me ok, or?

{General Negative Response}

{Pause play with sound system}

Try it again.

Ok, how’s that?

Is it any better?

Ok, how’s that?

{General Positive Response}

Plug it in…

Yeah, that would help, yes.

Ok, ladies and gentlemen, Jim Butcher.

{Applause}

Ok, first things first: Yes, my hair is cut. {Laughter} It’s not an illusion.  Oh, and one other thing before we get started, as folks come through the line tonight, if you could, and this is kind of a personal quirk, but if you could please refrain from telling me not to die. {Laughter} I think that’s sort of implied, and that I’m going to be working on that one anyway, so I don’t want you to jinx me here.  Ok, that being said, I’m happy to back here.  I always love coming to Mysterious Galaxy, but if you guys want to ask some questions, I’ll try and give you some answers, and then we’ll get to book signings.

Can you turn up the volume any?

It’s already up as far as it will go.  I can talk louder, though. {Clenches fist} {Laughter}

{Camera breaks out, comes back in}

Me and my engineering terminology for magic. {Laughter}

Just thinking about a certain couple that are locked up. {Jim nods}

 {Next Person}
Just a general question, how do you pronounce Harry’s godmother’s name?

Well, she is the Leanansidhe.  Harry’s the one who calls her Lea.

Ok but it’s / Le-an-she / ?

/ La-nan-she /. Yeah, Leanansidhe or something like that.  I think that’s the closest it’s going to get.  It’s Gaelic, it doesn’t have to make sense. {Laughter}

Thank you

Yeah, no problem.

{Next Person}

Yeah, in the back.

You go to great pains to describe the beer at McAnally Pub.  Is that based on anything in reality or do you make your own? {Laughter}

No, I actually, I don’t drink at all.  I’m one of those guys whose family tree has got way too many co-instances of alcoholic-felon. {Laughter} So, I thought perhaps it would be wise if I didn’t go that direction. That way I can bail other people out.

{Next Person}
Does that inform on Dresden?

I dunno, maybe. {Laughter} He can handle it.  He can have some beer in the fridge, and no big deal.  I get the feeling that I’d turn into a fiend after the second or third swallow.

{Next Person}
Is your writing pace going to change now that the Codex Alera is finished?

Nah, not much.  I’m going to be doing a Dresden book every year, and one other book, and I’m probably going to do some extra short-stories on the side.  The next book I’m doing hasn’t been set certainly, for certain yet, and I haven’t gotten it sold or anything. So, it’s still a little bit up in the air about what I’m going to do next.  Hopefully, It’ll be a… I’m going to be writing it with my friend Cam Banks, who is the only person I’ve ever known who could actually stay sane long enough to work with me.  ‘Cause, you know, Cam’s the kind of guy where I can snarl, ‘We need to do it like THAT!’ and he’ll say, {In fake Aussie-ish accent} ‘Yeah, ok, whatever.’ {Laughter} He’s from New Zealand and he cannot be rattled.  It’s great. Anybody else?

{Next Person}
Are you planning a stand-alone or a new series?

Eventually, I’m going to write my epic, epic fantasy epic, which will be epic. {Laughter} But I’m not quite there yet. I’ve got a science fiction series that I’ve got the first half of the first book done, which has been hanging around for a long time.  I’ve got to finish it someday.  The one that I’m working on with Cam, I think we might be going with the post-apocalyptic fantasy.  You know, the brave heroes get together, they fulfill the prophecy, they take the tokens of power to the dark lord, and he cheats and collapses the castle on them and wins. And, the world is sunk into darkness and, then what?  And so it’ll be the ‘and then what?’ that I’ll be writing.

{Next Person}
How’d you get your first break?

Well, actually the first break I got didn’t pay off, and that was when my writing teacher looked at the manuscript to Storm Front that I did as a class project and said, ‘Yeah, this is good enough to sell.  I don’t know if it’ll be the first thing you’ll sell, but you’ll sell it eventually.’ She gave me a letter of recommendation to her editor {insert name} Buchanan at Ace, and Buchanan  had my manuscript on her shelf to be read for two years and ten months, before she eventually heard that I had sold it to somebody else. {Laughter} So that was the first break that didn’t really pan out the way we kind of hoped a break would.  Actually, the real break that I got was due to Laurell Hamilton.  I went to a convention she was at.  I wanted to go there and meet her anyway because I was a fan of her work, and I was on one of her fan lists online, so I got a bunch of questions together so that I could take them to Laurell for the fans.  And I also had wanted to target Laurell’s agent at the time, Ricia Mainhardt, and I knew she was going to be there as well, so I’d thought I’d go there and introduce myself and be able to get lucky.  So, I showed up, and in this mixer that was going on Friday night at this writing convention, poor Laurel was besieged by fans who, I mean it was ‘Richard, Jean-Claude, and this and that and everything.’ You could see this wild, haunted look around her eyes.  So, I kind of cruised in and barged in on the conversation and started talking about Buffy and Babylon 5.  And she was like, ‘I Love Buffy and Babylon 5!’ So we got to talking, and so I sort of saved her from the assault that was going on.  But the next day at the convention, it was lunch time and we were breaking for lunch, and I was bumping around, you know bumping into walls like I do when I don’t have my wife there to tell me what to do. And Laurel saw me and was like, and oh my gosh, this is pathetic, and she said, ‘Hey, Jim.  A bunch of us are going to lunch. You wanna go?’ And I was like, ‘I eat lunch!’ {Laughter} Since I’m a social genius. And so I went to lunch with Laurel, and like three other writers and three or four editors and like half a dozen agents.  And it turned out a bunch of them liked Buffy and Babylon 5. {Laughter} We talked about it over lunch and by the end of the weekend I’d had, Laurel’s agent had offered to represent me.  And I said, ‘YES! No take-back-sies!’ {Laughter} And then, the agent I’m actually working with now, Jennifer Jackson was, also made an offer to me. And I said, I looked at her and I said, ‘But, but, but, but, but, but I sent you, you rejected my manuscript like two weeks ago!’ She goes, ‘I know.’ ‘You sent me back a crooked photocopy of a form rejection.’ She said, ‘Yeah, I know.’ {Laughter} ‘And now you’re offering? Why are you offering this to me now?’ And she’s like ‘Well, you know, now I’ve met you, and you play dice-less role playing.  You’re my kind of nerd.’ It’s like {Jim rolls eyes}{Laughter} But that was kind of how the first break panned out.

{Next Person}
Are you planning on offering any franchising spin-offs of the Alera series?

See, that’s one of those things where I think there’s a big misconception among most readers; that is that the author’s the one that gets to pick, that kind of thing.  Really what it is, it’s not like I’ve got people beating down my door going, ‘Give us the rights to Alera!’ There’s been a little bit of interest.  If somebody took and I thought they were going to something kind of cool with it, I’d be like, ‘Yeah, ok, we can work with that.’ There’s been a little bit of interest in making it an animated series in Alera.  We’ll have to see if that pans out. There’s also been interest in an Alera style multi-player game.  I don’t know if that would work or not. We’ll have to see if that pans out. But yeah, folks will come to me and say, ‘We want to get the options for this, or that, or the other.’ And, as a writer you either can sell them the option or not, and that’s pretty much the only thing you can do.  I mean, you can take your stuff and peddle it door-to-door, but you really kind of don’t get the same reception as if they come to you.

I'm having issues following who's working on what... so do you have any that are as yet unclaimed?  I'd be happy to help out.