It’s funny how you make assumptions based upon the world of your imagination.  A number of people have told me that they didn’t understand why the werewolves in LADY LAZARUS are members of  the Nazi SS.  One person even expressed a wish that my story didn’t have “all those werewolves” in it (as if it would be a bad thing to have werewolves!  The very notion! LOL )

My first impulse is to say, “Of course the wolves are Nazis, because…they are.”  That’s just how they appear in my mind, and when I write about this stuff I go with what I have.

But my imagination is working off the research I did to create the characters and situations that end up playing out.  Historical fantasy, at least the way I write it, grows out of the actual history of the period.  The werewolves are Nazis in LADY LAZARUS (though not necessary 100% through the entire series) because:

 1.  There was an actual SS Werewolf unit — It was formed to conduct guerilla and partisan operations should the Germans lose the war. 

 2.  Hitler’s chief outpost on the Eastern Front was called Wolf’s Lair, in Northern Poland; this was the site of the famous 1944 assassination plot depicted in the Tom Cruise movie Valkyrie.

3.  Hitler called himself “wolf” and loved his German shepherd “Blondi” more than most or all of the human beings in his life.  He identified strongly with wolves, and I imagined that werewolves would have strongly identified with him, to the point of naming him Pack Leader Supreme.

Generally speaking, the most fanciful parts of LADY LAZARUS are the ones closest to the truth…and the parts that seem most outrageous are the ones I didn’t make up at all

I *just* got my author copies yesterday, and they are beautiful…most of them are already spoken for, but I have saved a copy to give away here.

Please tell me where you’ve seen LADY LAZARUS, either online or in a brick and mortar store.  Every mention in the comments here is an entry in the contest.  I will pick a winner on SEPTEMBER 7th.

Let me know where you find her!

LADY LAZARUS is officially in the wild today!

Order – Borders

Order – Amazon

Order – Barnes & Noble

Order – Books-a-Million

Here’s the beginning of the book.  Hope you enjoy it!

JULY, 1945, Paris

I damned my soul in the summer of 1939.  I did it for the noblest reasons, the best ones – to save the people I loved; to make a terrible wrong turn right.  But still I am tormented by the thought that my sins overwhelmed my intentions and turned my noble sacrifices to dust even as I made them.  Only time will tell if my desperate measures, in the end, were justified.

In my mind, that final summer is saturated with golden sunlight.  My beloved home – gilded Budapest, the Paris on the Danube – glittered brilliantly in the sun, even blighted as it was by the stain of fascism.  The cafés still buzzed with energy, the city still throbbed at night. My Budapest still lived.

And I felt at home there like no other place I have lived before or since.  To me, a girl of only twenty, Budapest was the culmination of a life’s dream of freedom.  My family, originally from the northern mountain town of Tokaj, was drawn to Budapest’s brilliant light at the end of the nineteenth century, and my father, a wine trader, eventually made his fortune.  

Not even the depredations of Bela Kun’s Bolshevik regime in 1919, followed by the genial fascist toad, that hypocrite Regent Horthy, not even an army of their small-minded followers could destroy the restless creativity of the city.  I knew it was dangerous to be a Jew.  But I had one secret advantage, and I clung to it for dear life.

I was a Lazarus.  And the eldest daughter of an eldest daughter.

The city teemed with magical folk, living alongside the pure mortals.  Vampires, dryads, dwarves, other, hidden, immortal beings – and the adepts, the sorcerers, necromancers, and witches.  As for me, I am a Lazarus witch.  My power is passed from mother to daughter, and has been so conveyed since time out of mind.

My mother, bless her vanished soul, tried her best to teach me the Lazarus creed and how to use the power I inherited, and the dangers such a power brings, but I was born rebellious.  And when she died suddenly, my training was still unfinished.  I preferred to haunt the cafes, debate Communism and literary theory with half-starved poets living on weak tea and rum balls, indulge in mad affairs of the mind and heart that in the end led absolutely nowhere.  In short, I was a young fool, but a happy one.

The trouble crept up on all of us, a shadow that lengthened over everything we knew.  Horthy’s regime was dreadful, but after the disaster of Bela Kun, we all believed we could survive the Regent.  So we, the Jews, kept our heads down and worked.  And we, the witches, kept to our creed, respected the destructive potential of our powers and invoked them rarely.  We told ourselves useful lies, that the trouble would soon pass.  And a fragile balance held.

Such a state, balanced on lies, could not sustain itself for long.  Despite this, when the end came, none of us was ready.

And now I hold my breath, my pen hovers over the paper before I write.  How can I explain to you, a stranger, what has happened to me?  At this pause in my earthly trials, I do not know which is better:  to press forward and leave the past to die, or to commit my strange tale to paper.

Well I know the power of words.  In many instances, I am the only witness, the only one still living who knows of the great-hearted sacrifices of those who are now gone, the only one who can now remember.  So:  I write this story not to glorify the living, but to honor the dead.

The summer of ’39 is seared into my mind, and lives on forever unchanged in my memory.  Hitler had not yet invaded Poland, war had not yet exploded the world I had known into irredeemable shards.  I was still a girl, the future still lay before me, indefinable, infinite with possibility.

I was still kissing-close to the people I loved most in the entire world.  And simple love matters more than magic, treasure, or even the promise of eternal life. It is for love that I now set this strange tale into words.

Remember this as you read on, for though my story has its triumphs, in the end it has always come back to two fundamental questions:

Who do you love? 

Do you seek the darkness or the light?

As I was uncovering primary sources and researching 1930s Budapest, I came across this translation of a Hungarian newspaper of the period:

(If you’d like to generate your own newspaper clipping, you can check out The Newspaper Clipping Image Generator — but please make sure the image is safe to download by scanning it for viruses etc)

I’ll update you with more “background research” as I upload it

LADY LAZARUS comes out next Tuesday, August 31st (!!!). 

I am actually going to venture out of my writing cave, and wanted to list my live appearances over the next few months — if you are going to be in NYC anytime from August 31st onwards, please let me know because I am going to be out and about quite a bit in September and October.

 September 4: Victorian Romance Tea at SoHo Gallery for Digital Art

The SoHo Host Club is pleased to announce our next event: a Victorian Romance Tea with reading by special guest Tor author Michele Lang from her book LADY LAZARUS, a world of WWII, demons, weres, and cafe culture! Handmade jewelry by MY MOTHER’S BEADS will be offered for sale via personal table service. Elegant Goth Loli or Victorian attire encouraged.

Saturday, September 4, 4-8 p.m.
$20 for unlimited tea, sweets, and surprises! 
Buy Tickets (it’s almost sold out!)

September 6: Lady Jane Salon

Monday, September 6, 7 – 9 p.m.

Madame X, 94 West Houston Street, New York, NY

Join us for a very special Labor Day Lady Jane’s with guest authors Michele Lang, Cat Johnson, Cecilia Tan, and Rebecca Rogers Maher.  This month: prezzies! A free copy of Cecilia Tan’s MIND GAMES to the first 50 guests. Also, we’re raffling two signed copies of Anna Campbell’s UNTOUCHED ($1 per chance).

Admission: $5 or one gently used ppb romance novel. Net proceeds support an end-of-year donation to a NYC group serving women in need.
Cash bar.

Launched in February 2009 by Leanna Renee Hieber, Hope Tarr, Maya Rodale & Ron Hogan (Beatrice.com), Lady Jane’s Salon is NYC’s first and so far only monthly reading series for romance fiction. Monthly meet ups on the first Monday of the month unless otherwise noted

September 12: book signing at Book Revue, Huntington NY

Sunday, September 12th at 3 p.m.

BOOK REVUE – 313 New York Avenue, Huntington NY 11743
Tel: (631) 271-1442

Long Island author MICHELE LANG will speak about and sign her new fantasy novel, Lady Lazarus. 

**If you cannot make a live book signing and want to get a signed book from me, please contact me via email and I will coordinate with Book Revue to get a signed copy sent to you!**

September 20: NAIBA conference, Atlantic City, NJ

I’ll be at the Author Reception on Monday night at 9 p.m.

October 8 – 10: New York ComicCon (schedule TBD)

October 28 – 31: World Fantasy Con (schedule TBD)

Whew — that’s it for now.  I’ll update this post with more information — and for those who can’t meet me in the Real World, I will post a blog touring schedule once I get some more dates firmed up.  Hope to see you out there!

OK, I usually try not to squee over reviews, but this one is too good, and it’s a great way to kick off the countdown to LADY LAZARUS’s release:

I wanted to thank you for all your support, so I have a present for you — a free story!

This is an extended version of the story that appeared last year in the MAMMOTH BOOK OF TIME TRAVEL ROMANCE - I recommend the entire collection. 

“The Walled Garden” tells the story of Mireya Rodriguez, a young woman with a turbulent past, and the secret world she discovers underneath New York City in the 1980s:

 THE WALLED GARDEN

Hope you enjoy it!  If you want to get it in a format other than .pdf, you can also find it on Smashwords — I’m also hoping to get it up on Kindle within a week or two.

Thanks again

As I’ve mentioned before, both Alison Kent and Charlene Teglia are revisiting the classic The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, and exploring their progress on their blogs.   Inspired by their example, I’ve taken up the book myself and started working through the weekly chapters for the first time in mumbledy-mumble years.

Check out the Artist’s Way site for an overview of the process — basically, you read a chapter a week of the book, work through some exercises, and use the basic tools of the morning pages and the artist’s date to get in touch with your creative currents.  Here’s a snip that will give you an idea of the two major components in the book:

Morning Pages

Morning Pages are three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. There is no wrong way to do Morning Pages– they are not high art. They are about anything and everything that crosses your mind– and they are for your eyes only.

The Artist Date

The Artist Date is a once-weekly, festive, solo expedition to explore something that interests you. The Artist Date need not be overtly “artistic”– think mischief more than mastery.

Some quick observations from this time on the trail so far:

1.  Morning Pages:  I used to resent the hell out of these pages as “a waste of time.”  That sense of scarcity, of not having enough time has been a long-term issue with me, both when I had a day job to contend with, and also having a houseful of kids.  Now, I luxuriate in these pages, revel in writing without an agenda.  I love writing longhand, and the words just flow, without my infernal scheming about how to sell them.  Delicious.

2.  Artist’s Date:  Again, love having the permission to do these.  I have very simple, kinda dumb, artist dates.  I go to Target and buy scented candles.  I go to a local cafe and stare at the wall while drinking coffee.  I go to the beach and watch sailboats coming into the harbor.  And yet lately, after these seemingly aimless little junkets I come away with profound insights into my process, the things that obsess me, and my unspoken fears.

3.  Exercises.  I do some of them, less than the last time I came through the book.  Many of them explore issues that, frankly, I have explored to death in my own life.  But the ones that are designed to trick you into having fun are tremendously useful to me — I’ve been such a grim little soldier lately that it’s good to lighten me up a little!

Best of all, this time around the process has helped uncover what motivates me as a writer and a person.  What matters to me, where my home field advantage is, what comes easily to me and gives me joy.  Reading this book again has reminded me that if you tap into your passion, discipline no longer is that much of an issue. 

Basically, The Artist’s Way is designed to help you get out of the way of your creative drive.  I’ve eased back into my wrting groove, without floggings or even bribes — I enjoy the process itself.  And that’s just a pure pleasure

Hey, I’m back   I enjoyed my unplugged week a lot, got a ton of writing done, and now I’m bright-eyed and ready to face the world. (well,kinda LOL)

Tonight I’m reading at a new cafe in town, Olives by the Sea, along with the fabulous writer Bianca D’Arc.  Here are the details:

  Join us for an Authors’ Reading on Wednesday, August 4^th at 8pm at Olives by The Sea

304 Sea Cliff Ave – 516-671-6548  

Enjoy the warm ambience of this new cafe in Sea Cliff & meet two local authors as they share excerpts from their works.  

Please join Michele Lang and Bianca D’Arc for their reading and discussion of “How To Get Published”.  Bianca and Michele will read from their work and engage the audience in an interactive discussion about publishing and the writer’s life.  Learn about agents, writers groups, ebooks, and more.  

Michele Lang is the author of a half a dozen novellas and novels that have been published both electronically and in print.  Her historical fantasy LADY LAZARUS will release in September 2010 from Tor Books.  Find her on the web at www.michelelang.com

Bianca D’Arc has run a laboratory, climbed the corporate ladder in the shark-infested streets of Manhattan, studied and taught martial arts, and earned the right to put a whole bunch of letters after her name, but she’s always enjoyed writing more than any of her other pursuits. She grew up and still lives on Long Island, where she keeps busy with an extensive garden, several aquariums full of very demanding fish, and writing her favorite genres of paranormal, fantasy and sci-fi romance.  www.biancadarc.com  

This event is produced by: The Creative Arts Studio of Sea Cliff, www.seacliffcreative.com

This week is RWA Nationals, and romance writers are converging on Disney World to talk shop, learn craft, make important connections, and immerse themselves in the writing world with their tribe.  It’s awe-inspiring, exhausting, and hilarious — often all in the same moment

This year, for various reasons, I am not able to go to Nationals.  Part of me is sad to miss the chance to meet up with my writing buddies again, but I intend to make the most of the time I have here at home.  I love the total focus on the industry at Nationals, but this year I need the focus to be on my writing and the creative process itself.  I need to go deep, and to do that I need to concentrate my focus. (Thanks Kaz for the idea of tapping your passion, going deep as the engine for discipline, and unplugging from the eworld to do that!)

I am going to *pretend* I’m going to Nationals, and will take a writer’s retreat from the Internet beginning Wednesday, July 28th.  I’ll be back on Monday, August 2nd.  Until then, check out these fantastic resources, and make an online version of Nationals for yourself this week too!

*For a couple of years, the amazing Paperback Writer held a Left Behind and Loving It online symposium.  Check here for a free e-book PBW made of the LB & LI series (this one is from 2009 but you can find links to the other ones on the sidebar at her blog) and learn about craft, the writing life, and more.

*This year, Romance Divas is having an online conference, Not Going to Conference Conference, to coincide with Nationals, with workshops and prizes.  You need to sign up with the forum but it’s free.

*Alison Kent is hosting an ongoing Artist’s Way creative cluster at her blog (thanks to Charlene Teglia for the tip).

Have a fantastic week, and wish me luck as I go deep into my writing