A train ride down the Hudson. It sounds so prosaic. I expected it to be your average train ride despite what the gentleman had said. I even had a book out and in my lap as we pulled out of the station in Albany. I never opened the book.
I’m a high desert rat. I think the mountains of New Mexico are unequaled for beauty, but we do get cheated on the fall colors. Our aspens are exquisite, turning the sides of the Sangre de Cristos into sheets of shimmering gold, but gold is pretty much what we get. But the cliffs and hillsides lining the Hudson was like a mad artist’s palette — gold, red, orange, rust, yellow, titan. The grass was still green so the trees seemed to spring up like the scarves on swirling dancers. Add to that the gray of the granite and you had a backdrop of equisite beauty. When we went clicking and swaying past the robber barons ruined castle I had this momentary sense we had somehow passed through a fold in space and time and were suddenly in Scotland. (Apparently the castle was a folly that was eventually used to store munitions and had the expected bad result. If someone has the full story I’d love to hear it.)
The Hudson is an impressive body of water. I’m used to the Rio Grande that sinks to a slender muddy ribbon by the end of August and is completely dry south of Albuquerque because so many farmers rely on its water. The Hudson had actual eddies and waves that caught the sunlight and threw it back like spears of silver. I was especially charmed by the tiny lighthouses set on rock islands in the center of the river.
Some of the homes along the water would qualify as mansions, but they were dwarfed by the gray bulk of West Point looming high on a cliff. I’m told that the train ride from New York to Montreal is non-stop beauty. It makes me want to fly to NY and take the train up to WorldCon in 2009.
Once at Penn Station it was an easy cab ride to our hotel on W 57th across the street and just down from Carnegie Hall. As a former singer, music minor I loved the fact we were so close to that great performance center. That was my one disappointment with our trip. We never did get to hear any music, but we were only in town for three nights, and they were very busy nights.
Ian had been to New York several times before, but had never done any of the silly, tourist things. So being a total kid about this kind of thing, I set about to rectify that oversight. After lunch at a great Thai place (we’d found the food in Saratoga to be really bland) we went walking until we reached the Empire State Building, and I took Ian up to the observation deck. As we gazed out in each of the four directions I gave him the Wild Cards tour of New York. “Now over there is Joker Town, and it was here that Fortunato made love to Peregrine so he had enough power to fight the Astronomer.”
We had a dinner date with our agent, the amazing Kay McCauley. We changed, and walked to the Beekman Towers for drinks on the 24th floor, art deco bar. Kay was her usual vibrant self, and I got a great picture of her and Ian. We then went walking up uptown in search of dinner. We ended up at this terrific little French bistro. We sat in the window so we could watch New York going past, and talked about life, and art, and Minnesota. Kay and Ian are both from Minneapolis. We eventually got around to business Ian made it clear that what he really wanted was the chance to tell the entire Milkweed story so if he got an offer, Ian wanted a deal on all three books.
We finally finished off our coffee and dessert and headed back to the hotel discussing our wonderful agent and enjoying the energy and excitement of NYC.
Next morning we grabbed subway passes from a kiosk and headed off to see The Cloisters. This is one of my favorite spots in NY. The city seems very far away as you walk through the park and look down at the Hudson River. It was rainy and misty and grey so the square tower of grey stone with it’s red tinged stone roof seemed dream-like as we came around a curve and saw it looming over the trees. A few more feet, then the stone walls of the Cloisters are in front of you. You pass through an archway, through a heavy brass bound wooden door and you’ve stepped back centuries.
Rockefeller brought together pieces of monasteries, chapels, etc. from all over Europe to build this amazing building. He wanted to be sure to preserve his view across the Hudson so he also bought all the land on the palisades across the river. Nothing can ever be built there. The building now houses most of the medieval art from the Met in this perfect setting. It’s most famous for The Unicorn Tapestries and they dominate one enormous room. But there are other treasuers, a tenth century cross carved from walrus tusk, illuminated manuscripts, exquisite carved reliqueries made of rose wood, tomb effigies. I actually find these very compelling because there was an effort to capture the features of the knight who is entombed beneath. I wonder what they thought? Did they love their wives? Did they want to be warriors? I find myself looking into the stone faces and looking through to the living person.
We left the museum at noon, and had planned to grab lunch and then head off to the Met to use our entry tickets again. But there was a message from the agent on Ian’s phone. We stood in the park as the sun came breaking through the clouds and danced on the water’s of the river, and I watched Ian’s face as he learned from Kay that he had a three book deal with Tor Books for the Milkweed Triptich. Other than two Wild Card stories this is his first professional sale. It will be the first of many.
I found myself remembering my first sale, and that sense of delrious joy. It was a wonderful moment to be able to share in the culmination of so much work and effort. Critical Mass had helped with a plot break, and the usual critiques at our monthly meetings, but this is his victory — a genius idea, beautifully executed. Everyone is in for a real treat when the first book comes out.
The Met was right off our agenda. We couldn’t concentrate on anything but this news, and we had to get ready to go out to dinner with Tom Dougherty, the publisher of Tor books, and Ian’s new editor, (and my editor) Patrick Nielsen-Hayden, George R.R. and our agent, Kay.
We got all dressed up, and went over to George’s hotel to wait for our car. George loves this old steak house over in Brooklyn, Peter Lugar’s so that’s where we were going.
When we walked in Tom shook Ian’s hand, and said “Welcom aboard”. It was a great moment because Tor really does feel like a family. Of course they want to make money, it’s a business, but they really try to help a writer find an audience, and they don’t expect you to hit a home run the first time you’re up at bat.
Tom is a real “bookman”. He loves books, and is fighting to keep great books in the hands of readers despite a distribution system that works against anything but the known Big Best Seller. He talked about how the drivers knew their routes, knew what kind of books sold in what neighborhoods, could nuture a book, but that is all gone. It was a fascinating look at the industry from the business side, and I valued the lesson.
I made Patrick jump out of his chair and give a shout of joy when I mentioned Paul Cornell. It’s neat to discover that your editor shares your passion for Dr. Who, and who sees the power and value in having writers cross back and forth between screen and page.
It was an early evening since we couldn’t get a later table. Which left us all back at the hotel at 8:30. Kay went home, but Ian, George and I sat in the bar and had drinks and talked for a few more hours. I discovered the Bellini Martini, and it was wonderful. I held at one though I could have had another. If I had the boys would have had to carry me back to The Salisbury Hotel.
Wednesday I had a business breakfast then Ian and I took a walk through Central Park. The 19th century carousel was still up and running so we took a ride, and I dreamed about my new horse.
We had an appointment at Tor at 2:00 for me to see my cover art. (Which you have now seen and which I love.) Patrick loaded us down with free books, and I was able to talk to him about the rewrite I wanted to do on the second EDGE book. He said something fascinating and very thought provoking. I’ll throw it out here, and I’d love to get some discussion going on this point.
I told him I wanted to reduce the number of view point characters from 7 to 4, and cast my protagonist’s sections in first person. He said those sounded like good ideas because he said, “You want reading to be like a trance. You want to make reading easy. You don’t want reading to be such an effort that blood is bursting from your forehead.” This ties in totally with Daniel Abraham’s thoughts about accessability. I’ve started to think of it as removing impediments to achieving that trance. Or as Maurice Hurley, my old boss on Star Trek used to say, “A simple story well told”, and “Just say the words.”
Patrick slipped us into Tom’s office at the point of the Flatiron Building to see the view. For an instant as Tom pointed out the Chrysler Building and the lake in Central Park, and the Empire State I had this feeling that I was caught in a great stream of history. When I looked down at the people walking far below I could visualize the top hats of 1902, and the snap brim fedora’s of the thirties, Go Go Boots in the sixties, and sailing through this sea of lives and memories was the building, like the prow of some great ship.
As Ian and I rode the subway back to our hotel I clutched my book cover, and we shared a little manta. “Three books.” “Great Cover.”
We were joing Sam and Susan for dinner in China Town that night, and to get to the subway station we walked past some of the most elegant stores in New York, Bergdof Goodman’s, Tiffany’s etc. Then we got to China Town, and we were walking through throngs of people inching between small stores whose wares tumbled out onto the sidewalks as if the stores had been tipped on their sides and shaken — DVD’s, purses, scarves, shoes, radios, fish stands with whole fish laying on beds of ice and staring up at us from a single bulging eye, fruit and vegetable stands. We found the restaurant and Sam and Susan waiting.
I unlimbered my camera, and snapped a photo at the moment Ian told them about his book sale. It’s wonderful when you have good friends with whom you can share joy. Too often in life people begrudge you your moments of joy and victory. A real friend is the person who takes joy in your wins, and never feels diminished by your success.
Finally, reluctantly we parted from our friends, and headed back to the hotel. Thursday was a day to face Security Theater, and airplanes, and a return to the work-a-day world. But –
Three books!
Great Cover!
Melinda
