As we seem to be coming up to the first of the month (whatever happened to January?) I’m open to questions again. If you have something to ask about writing in general, or about LRK’s writing in particular, or indeed, about any other topic that catches your fancy, I’ll do my best to answer, or…

Gung hai fat choy, to you all. It’s the lunar New Year, which makes it appropriate that we talk about beginnings. Some beginnings are quiet and inexorable. Others take rather more work. The beginnings of TOUCHSTONE are proving to be the latter. Then again, with three main characters whose voices need nailing down early on…

First to check in on the ART OF DETECTION front is Fran from the Seattle Mystery Bookshop, who says: Laurie R. King’s fans who are eagerly awaiting her latest Mary Russell novel might, at first blush, be saddened by the fact that The Art of Detection is a return to her Kate Martinelli series, but…

There’e2’80’99s an articulate essay on the art of editing over on M. J. Rose’e2’80’99s page, do take a look. At the moment, however, I’e2’80’99m more concerned with the raw material that will eventually go under the editorial pencils. Yesterday I was working along as usual, paddling my little boat of narrative laboriously through the shallows…

Okay, that’s final. It’s the end of civilization and proof positive that This Country is Going to Hell in a Handbasket. Because I’m getting a little concerned that an aging Land Rover as the sole form of transport for three people, two of whom are over eighty, is not a really great idea, I went…

On Saturday I was asked to speak at the re-opening of one of the Santa Cruz libraries, this the Live Oak branch. I rarely say no to libraries, particularly those within driving distance, so I went, and talked about beginnings–of libraries, of readers (my early days of reading having been in the central branch of…

Apropos of the last flurry of blog/comments, the Telegraph has a project going, encouraging people to write a novel in a year (thanks to Sarah Weinman for the tip. ***In the meantime, I too have begun the novel for the year. Or at any rate, I’e2’80’99ve begun to push ideas around on my plate like…

A point of clarification, with the Bearded iris lady in mind. By saying that one is not required to produce a book before one dies, I am by no means saying one should not do so if one wants to. By all means write a book, write ten books, I shall be very happy for…

This makes the third and last installment of the January Ask LRK session. If yours didn’e2’80’99t appear here, it’e2’80’99s either because it was a personal question, which I’e2’80’99m not going to answer, or because it came in after my arbitrary cutoff day and will have to be repeated next month. And by the way, please…

Really, no more questions. If we don’t hit yours on this round, it’e2’80’99s not that we don’e2’80’99t love you, we just want to let you have another chance on the first of next month. Q: I was wondering why you, a straight woman, made Kate M a lesbian? It seems unusual to me. A: Unusual…