night circus – Page 9 – erin morgenstern

night circus advance copies

I received a rather rained-on cardboard box this morning.

This is what was inside:

These are Advance Reader Copies of THE NIGHT CIRCUS. Commonly referred to as ARCs, which I’m still not entirely sure stands for Advanced Reading or Advance Reader or some combination thereof. I’m pretty certain that the C is for Copy, though. Even though these say “Edition” on the front.

They’re hard to photograph because all of the silver is metallic and shiny. They’re really gorgeous, and this isn’t even the final cover.

I have been dying to share a look at the interior design ever since saw a preview of it ages ago, because I absolutely adore it, and now I have permission to share.

I’d tell you I love it so much because I think it’s evocative of both the Stargazer and the bonfire, but that wouldn’t make sense to that many of you yet. Ah well.

I only have ten copies so I am thinking very carefully about what to do with each one. There will likely be some sort of contest/giveaway at some point.

And I kind of want to leave one in some mysterious location somewhere and give clues to find it. Maybe after the snow melts.

By erin, 14 years ago

writing

mostly posting for the antelope

Change of scenery! This is where I’m sitting this week, going over my first pass pages. I will likely not be online all that much while I read and re-read pretty, pretty pages. Tessa keeps stealing my chair if I abandon it for too long, so I should probably get back there.

(And I should really throw away that mini pumpkin on the windowsill. It’s been there since October. It’s probably frozen.)

Also, if you click this link you will find a baby antelope with the littlest legs and teensy feets and I don’t even know how he’s standing up and I love him.

By erin, 14 years ago

miscellany

also, today is my half birthday & i should really have half a cake

As you may have noticed, I was in NYC for the past few days.

I met my agent and my editor in person for the first time. They are, in fact, actual people and not just lovely disembodied telephone voices.

I drank a lot of wine with my sister. I got snowed on in Times Square. I met the resident kitty at the Algonquin.

I generally felt like I’d wandered into someone else’s life.

It’s going to take awhile for this to fit on me properly. Like breaking in new boots.

And then last night, while I was on the train back to Boston, my Google alerts kind of exploded with the Summit film option announcement.

I’m thrilled about it, of course. It’s not helping that whole endeavoring to become more of a believer thing, though. Every time I think this whole journey might get less surreal eventually, things like this happen and I’m reduced to blinky-eyed deer in headlights mode and I say “yay” a lot, because I’m articulate like that.

Oh, and since some of the announcements have mentioned it as such, I should probably clarify that The Night Circus is not a young adult novel. It will probably have a lot of appeal for teenage readers & fans of YA, but it is indeed an adult-market book.

Home now, with kittens who claim not to have missed me. Fluffy little liars.

By erin, 14 years ago

writing

so what’s the book about?

I’ve had a lot of people ask me what the book is about.

I rather like the very long sentence that Publisher’s Marketplace used in the deal announcement:

Erin Morgenstern’s THE NIGHT CIRCUS, set at the turn of the 19th century, which tells the story of two young magicians, pawns in an age-old rivalry between their mercurial, illusionist fathers, and the enchanted circus where their competition (and romance) plays out, leaving the fates of everyone involved – from creators and performers to patrons – hanging in the balance.

I also applaud the use of the word mercurial, which is one of my favorite words.

By erin, 14 years ago

writing

this is not my beautiful house

A little over a week ago, when I found out my novel was going to be sent out to publishers, I bought this bottle of sparkling syrah to open if and when the book sold:

Notice how it’s open.

Yeah.

I have spent most of the weekend giggling hysterically and consuming bubbly alcohol, thinking to myself: This is not my beautiful house. This is not my beautiful wife.

How did I get here?

Well, I got here by starting this novel in 2006 and not abandoning it. I got here because I have an amazing, amazing agent who spent the last year helping me make my manuscript better than I ever thought it could be when I started querying. I got here because I have a team of endlessly talented writer friends who live in my computer, who never let me give up even when the Revisionland Hotel started feeling like the Hotel California.

I spent most of last week on the phone with editors who loved my strange nocturnal black & white circus novel.

On Friday afternoon, THE NIGHT CIRCUS sold to Doubleday.

To say I am elated would be the understatement of the century. I am delighted beyond belief, and I am absolutely thrilled to be working with my editor. (My editor! It’s like the my agent game all over again!)

So I lift a glass of sparkling syrah to each and every person who got me here.