Chapter Nine: The Witch Lands in Seattle

Hello!

We’re very excited that physical copies of The Witch of Prague arrived at Huw’s house just now. See below!

Over the next few weeks, we’ve got a whole lot of IRL things happening. Real-life books! Things you can touch! The AWP conference! Live events!

Are you in Seattle? Come and see Rachel and J.M. Sidorova chat about publishing, writing and the Witch next Tuesday, March 10. More below.

If you’re at the AWP conference in Baltimore this weekend, you can grab a sneak-preview copy of Witch from the Asterism stand. Or: as always, Huw can post you one if you order direct from us. We just switched on shipping to the UK and NZ.

Excitedly,

Huw, Rachel, Rebekah & Lara

Thank goodness one of us has the garage space for 1000 books

“The green is very bright,” says Huw. That’s exactly how we intended it to be. A neon so luminous it makes the title glow. The back cover can probably help you find your way in the dark.

See for yourself: the Witch’s official publication date is March 17, and we’ll be sending out pre-orders to (hopefully) arrive on exactly that date. You can get your own fluorescent book here.

Next week: Join us for a talk about writing, editing, and publishing

We think this is going to be kinda cute, actually.

Next week, Homeward’s Rachel Sobel and author J.M. Sidorova will be interviewing each other: Sidorova’s going to quiz Rachel on editing, starting a publishing company, and the world of small presses, while Rachel’s going to ask Sidorova about writing, politics, Prague, and the process of being a published author.

Rachel was The Witch of Prague’s editor, so both have an inside view of the novel itself as well as different experiences in the world of publishing. And: we’ll have sneak-peek copies of the book for sale. More details here.

Can’t make it next week? Also in Seattle, Third Place Books is hosting Sidorova in conversation with Daryl Gregory on Monday, March 23 at 7pm. That event is free, but please RSVP.

And there’s more! Elliott Bay Books is hosting Sidorova for an event on Thursday, April 2 at 7pm, in conversation with writer Rashida J. Smith. It’s also free—more details here.

Are you really trying to write fiction in your second language?

A question that J.M. Sidorova asked herself when she first began writing. Last week, she spoke to Clarkesworld Magazine about where The Witch of Prague originated.

Reviews of The Witch of Prague are arriving! Foreward, a website which reviews independently published books, called it propulsive, gritty, whimsical, and hopeful.

World Literature Today finds that the novel “invites us to probe more deeply the metaphors we make and by which we live.”

And Elliott Bay Books described it “a spy novel, a bildungsroman, and a fairytale retelling”. In fact, they were “completely blown away” by it. Us too!

And you can read about us in Publisher’s Weekly.

Things we looked at on the internet lately

How good are you at remembering and recreating colors? Do you want to spend a little bit of time finding out? How did they make that black, anyway? Here you go.

What’s the antidote to AI slop? Or the fact that there are now only five full-time book critics remaining in the US? Building our own literary infrastructure, punk-rock style.

P.S.

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