The Other Artemis Visits Camp Half-Blood

Thanks to Topher Bradfield of BookPeople for sharing the photos above from this summer's Camp Half-Blood in Austin! The campers were told to expect a visit from Artemis, and to listen for the sound of horns. Imagine their surprise when they heard the horn of a black SUV, and instead of a goddess, Eoin Colfer, author of Artemis Fowl, stepped out of the car. I'm told the kids went crazy with excitement.

Above, Eoin talks with the kids about his latest book, The Last Guardian, which concludes (sob) the Artemis Fowl series. I wish I could've been there, but I was traveling myself. Still, I'm so glad the campers got a chance to see Eoin, one of the funniest and nicest authors you could ever meet. And congratulations to Eoin on The Last Guardian. It's great to see Artemis Fowl back in action one more time!

The Red Pyramid Graphic Novel Arrives Oct. 2

The ad above will appear in selected Marvel comics to promote The Red Pyramid graphic novel, which will be published Oct. 2, the same day as The Mark of Athena! The adaptation is spectacular. I hope you guys enjoy it!

Cwned!

Poor Speedy literally busted a gut last week. Our Basenji-mix puppy, which we found abandoned in our driveway last Christmas, has become a beloved addition to the family. She's incredibly ADHD like the rest of us, and yet managed to sit at my feet for months while I was writing The Mark of Athena. In fact the book is dedicated to her, as she was sort of my muse and mascot while I worked.

Anyway, last week Speedy got a big red bulge in her tummy that turned out to be an abscess. She got through the surgery just fine, but now has Frankenstein sutures along her belly and has to wear this attractive plastic cone on her head for two weeks. On the vet's receipt, it's actually called an 'Elizabethan collar.' Zounds! Fortunately, Speedy is obsessive about her possessions, probably because she was abandoned by her last owners with nothing but her collar and leash. She gets very upset if we try to take her leash away or remove her collar. Now she's equally attached to her cone. If we take it off, she lets us know that she wants it back.

The cats are not quite sure what to make of this. Speedy will now charge up to them for a kiss and an entire cat will disappear inside the cone. At other times, Speedy likes to play cup-in-a-ball with the end of her leash, tossing up the end so it lands in the cone. She has also discovered that the cone is a great smell-enhancer when she is in the backyard. She will ram her face into the grass and inhale deeply, which is why our yard is now covered with very small crop circles. We're looking forward to removing the cone and getting her sutures out next week, but Speedy seems perfectly content.

And now back to writing. I feel a strange compulsion to write a Shakespearean drama with dogs.

My Weekend Homework

October 2 may seem a long way away, but I know the publication date for Mark of Athena is getting closer when my publishers begin sending me boxes of stuff to autograph. This weekend my job is to sign 1000 tip-in sheets for the limited U.S. edition of The Mark of Athena.

What does that mean? The box you see above is full of one thousand title pages from the book -- just the title page. I sign each one and send the box back to the printers, who then 'tip in' the sheets when they bind the book, so the book is printed with my signature already inside. Pretty cool, huh? Now this is only for the limited edition, which is a deluxe, more expensive collector's edition that comes in a slipcover box and has special artwork by John Rocco. The publisher is only printing one thousand total of these. They did the same thing for The Serpent's Shadow and The Son of Neptune. The regular edition of the book will be cool as well, but I couldn't sign all of those, since they print several million of them!

Next week, I anticipate getting a few thousand British tip-in sheets to sign, and I just finished signing a box of slipcovers for Taiwan. So, yeah, this is what I do on the weekends! Today, I plan on chilling out in the bedroom with the cats & dogs, listening to some music and signing away.

I'll share news about the book tour for Mark of Athena as the publication date gets closer. I usually don't find out where the publisher is sending me until about a month before -- so look for an announcement in September. And for more information, remember to check out the website's FAQ.

Son of Neptune around the world

Here are the most recent international versions of the Son of Neptune that I've received! It's always interesting to see how different publishers market the books around the world.

Above, the Finnish edition. The Finns decided the American cover art worked for them.

The complex Chinese edition above takes the concept and does their own spin on it.

And the Indonesians get creative with their own cover design, above, featuring Hazel, Frank and Percy zipping away on a chariot, with Arion on the lead.

Alice to Zeus: The Art of John Rocco

The amazing John Rocco, who has done the U.S. cover art for all my fantasy novels and who has written brilliant picture books of his own like Blackout, will be having an exhibition of his work at the Orlando Museum of Art! The opening is July 14, so if you live in the Orlando area, go meet John! If you can't make it on the 14th, the exhibit runs through October.