Wordcount: 24,000/100,000

Awesome title ideas: no further ones.

Body count: 1, 3 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl and 1 jaguar.

Best moment of the day: Everything appeared normal: a dead body was being carried back through the gates, followed by a procession of priests in grey cloaks.

Unexpected moment of the day: the jaguar’s death. Seriously. Some characters are just made of awesome.

Research: used the fact I owed my French publisher maps of the city to replace everything into a coherent system. Also found out about Tlatelolco via the Spanish version of Wikipedia.

Because of moments like those: I was looking for something else entirely (specifically, information about religion in Tlatelolco for a minor character in book 3), and happened upon an awesome tidbit of information related to the time period, which will fit great into the novel.
Research is made of awesome.

PS: apparently, book 3 is now listed on amazon, with a Sept. 1 2011 release date (and no title). Good to know while you’re writing it…
EDIT: OK, according to AR this is an erroneous listing, and the book will *not* be released on Sept 2011. Phew.

Wordcount: 17,000/100,000

Awesome title ideas: no further ones.

Body count: 1, 3 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl.

Best moment of the day: the Tlatelolco marketplace.

Unexpected moment of the day: the merchant. Thin, armed to the teeth, and determined to defend his goods…

Missing research: none so far.

Aka what happens when I have too much time on my hands and am procrastinating on the writing of book 3.

Want to know more? There’s the first chapter up here.

Wanna preorder? Random house | Amazon US | UK | B&N | Book Depository

(brought to you by the department of shameless self-promotion)

Wordcount: 14,600/100,000

Awesome title ideas: no further ones.

Body count: 1, 3 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl.

Best moment of the day: Teomitl interacting with children.

Unexpected moment of the day: Acatl’s family dynamics. The previous family meal scene was in book 1, and wow, how things have changed, two books later.
Unexpected moment of the day, #2: finding out all Aztec priests painted their whole bodies black. Ah. Would have been good to know this before I wrote two freaking books featuring a priest as a main character…

Missing research: not that I can see for tonight. Spent a lot of time figuring out how many nephews and nieces Acatl had, and what they were up to. The pile of books near my chair is now a complete mess.

Wordcount: 12,000/100,000

Awesome title ideas: no further ones.

Body count: 1, 3 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl.

Best moment of the day: the Zen warrior, part 2.

Unexpected moment of the day: recycling a scene from book 2 and opening up tons of fun possibilities for the end game.

Missing research: need to find some juicy anecdotes about Axayacatl’s reign (yup, you guessed it. The best book I had for that is the Hassig, which is still MIA).

Missing bits: we’re down to extra bits, with a little scene that I mean to use at the beginning of chapter 4.

Also met with my French editor Eclipse, and they are made of awesome. Got to do some thinking about forms of address and “tu/vous” in the translation, which should keep me busy for the weekend
The editor-in-chief also said it was the first time they were working with someone who understood the translation perfectly and could comment on how accurate and how close to the text/the original intent it was, and that it would be an interesting experiment…
BTW, the official French release date for the book is May 2011, with the other books to follow at six-month intervals.

That’s it. I’m off to have Chinese for my birthday dinner, and to find out about my presents (first one was the H’s renewing my Asimov’s subscription, which pleases me no end).

Bit of a wash today, due to a truncated lunch break.

Wordcount: 10,500/100,000

Awesome title ideas: no further ones.

Body count: 1, 3 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl.

Best moment of the day: autopsy from really, really far away (just to be sure there’s no contagion)

Unexpected moment of the day: the warrior with a Zen outlook on things.

Missing research: have to check where the blazes Metztitlan is and what happened there–which would be easier, had I not lost the Hassig book.

Missing bits: we’re down to extra bits, with a little scene that I mean to use at the beginning of chapter 4.

Wordcount: 9,500/100,000

Awesome title ideas: no further ones.

Body count: 1, 3 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl.

Best moment of the day: Acatl being called in to examine a sick man (yup, he only does autopsies )

Unexpected moment of the day: throwing in a further autopsy, just for the heck of it. Oh, and a character turning abruptly responsible.

Missing research: well, a missing book, really. I forgot Ross Hassig’s Aztec Warfare on the bus Thursday evening, and just realised it. Darn. I had to forget the expensive research book…

Missing bits: we’re down to extra bits, with a little scene that I mean to use at the beginning of chapter 4.

Wordcount: 8,000/100,000

Awesome title ideas: meep. None. Temp title is Gatherer of the Slain, which sucks.

Body count: 1, 1 in progress. Oh, and 1 owl.

Best moment of the day: Teomitl helping Acatl change boats–causing the grandmother of all traffic jams in the canal.

Unexpected moment of the day: inverting two chapters in the book for dramatic effect.

Missing research: still need to find out more about coronation wars.

Missing bits: 3 AA batteries for my Neo, so I can type on my bus journey.

Oh, BTW, my nano page is here (updated irregularly, but I’m making an effort).

Mainly for the UK people, or anyone who’s already read SoU (it’s got minor spoilers for SoU, so read at your peril): you can read chapter 1 of book 2, Harbinger of the Storm, here.