From: Eddie (epandele@yahoo.com)

It's not really a question, but this seems to be the only way I could say "thank you" :) Slow River was just translated in Romanian (see the book here: http://www.millenniumpress.ro/carti.php?id=2), I just finished reading it, liked it a lot, did a review for a romanian sci-fi list and went browsing the net to check on your other works. Once again, thank you for your work! Have a nice day.

I got my copies of Riul linistit last week. It's a nice-looking book. It got a mention in the February edition of the Romanian Playboy magazine. Wow: me, an old school feminist--the kind who used to get drunk/otherwise wasted and smash sex-shop windows with a brick (and I tell you what, those puppies hard to break)--pleased to be in Playboy; times do change. I've also just heard that Roxana Brinceanu, the translator, was awarded the Kult 2005 Award for best new translator for her work on the book. The awards ceremony was held in Bucharest. I'm delighted. It would, of course, have been cool to be there.

Actually, it would be cool to be almost anywhere. Seattle has been seriously living up to its "rain city" name the last couple of months. We've had landslides, and trees falling down, and wildlife around here looking bedraggled and miserable and wishing their ancestors had been domesticated in ages past. The notion of ex-communist European countries--Romania, Bulgaria, Ukraine--sounds quite enticing to me. I'm imagining espresso in tiny cups (not the same from those huge paper things at Starbucks or Tully's) and people smoking (oh, I miss smoking in public) and talking about something other than the Superbowl or the weather.

Mainly, though, I'm just restless. I've just finished a huge chunk of work on ALWAYS and now I have to figure out how to fit everything together. For most of March I'll be the Mad Mosaicist. Before then, though, I'll be in the UK for a couple of weeks, so that will probably get most of the cabin fever out of my system. Then it's back to Rain City and putting together the book, then starting in--well, actually I've already started--on a small but terribly exciting (to me; scary, too) project that I don't want to talk about just yet. Soon, though.

From: anonymous

Just to let you know that the Romanian edition of SLOW RIVER is now out for five days. It is a beautiful book, wonderfully translated, and I'm proud to have published it. Copies will be on their way to you soon. For all those wanting to get their hand on the Romanian edition, the address to go to is www.millenniumpress.ro. All best and more soon.

Yep, for those who haven't seen the book yet, go look at the cover, by Ona Frantz. It's a fantastic piece of work: woman, bound woman, and hints of cellular biology all in one image.

From: chris (christine.angele@net2000.ch)

Hello, I just read your answer to a question about Aud and Tammy having sex or not in Stay and it echoed my thoughts about this question just this afternoon, while I read the last pages of Stay. Somehow the end of the Blue Place left me stunned, with a feeling like a blow in the stomach, that it could end like this. I even hesitated to order Stay, wondering if I wanted to read about grief. But I'm very glad that I overcame this, since I really liked the second book a lot. So at the beginning of Stay there is this huge "void" filled with loss and grief but also remembered moments and ongoing inner conversation, but still a void. Then you see the relationship between Aud and Tammy develop and you wonder how far it will go. For me, if you had decided to write a sex scene, it would have been like covering up the loss of Julia too soon, although both women perhaps had needs, but not the same ones. I found it more interesting to read about other aspects developing in their relationship, like the moments of weakness/trust or human proximity, like when they hold each other.

All in all, thanks for those two books, which brought me an immense pleasure to read.

While I've been writing ALWAYS I've had to really weigh Aud's internal sex/love/grief economy. In the narrative present of the new novel, it's been a year since Julia died. Aud is a healthy, lusty woman. She wants sex. The problem is, she doesn't want entanglement and for her sex means connection, even if only briefly. She gets confused. I got confused, too, and wrote sex scenes I took out and put back in, took out again and am now considering once more putting it back in. And then, of course, she meets a woman who is nothing like Julia but who speaks to her on many, many levels. Naturally, not everything goes smoothly but--and here's a spoiler alert for those who don't like to know anything substantive about a book before they read the whole thing for themselves--I can guarantee no tragedy in this story. Yes, Aud does have some very hard times--but also a hell of a lot of fun. She learns a lot, and grows, and has much yummy sex and, y'know, beats the crap out of the bad people.

From: anonymous

I don't know if my last email reached you, but I wanted to write again just in case. I read "The Blue Place" over the summer and really enjoyed it. It was an inspiring book, and my favorite part was when Aud and Julia made the mission to the enemy's house and thus began the trouble they both faced throughout the rest of the novel. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that it was really terrific, and it's books like that and writers like you that make me want to become a writer myself. Thanks for your time! Can't wait to read your next masterpiece!

I'm sure your last email did reach me, but I admit I'm not very good at answering in timely fashion. (You may have noticed that my first answer here relates to events in January. Sigh.) I'm always months behind on these Ask Nicola questions. Partly it's that I get tired, or busy, or distracted. For example, between answering the first two questions and starting in on this one I've finished a massive chunk of ALWAYS, spent three weeks in England, had two nasty viruses, and generally gone on strike against the world, in protest at how...how bloody large and overwhelming it can be, sometimes. But I'm back. Partly I'm behind because I'm lazy. Partly it's, well, I'm not sure how to put this without writing whole essay on the subject and/or freaking anyone out, but every now and again I wonder at the wisdom of talking about myself in public this way. I don't believe I'll stop doing it but it's very un-English and sometimes gives me pause for thought.

From: anonymous

Uh, I'd like to think you were super drunk when you wrote your response to my comment about "what's your favorite quote and why." Ha! I loved it. It made me feel a bit dumb, though, and I didn't want to share the Spike quote after all.

But then I changed my mind. Who cares.

They were fighting the First. After Buffy got demoted from leader to outsider in the last season - and Faith was voted in by the potentials and the scoobies - Spike finds her in some random bedroom in some random house and he says to her "the hardest thing in life is to live it." Or something like that. Cheesy, I know! But I thought it was brilliant. Why? I dunno. Probably because it makes me think, "well, yeah, what else is there?" and that maybe the point of life isn't any one particular thing.

Not the same sort of quote you might be thinking of, but hey, I only had 250 words to expand on it and, well, I'm not a writer either.

I certainly had been celebrating the season, but drunk? Oh dear me, no [g]. You're right, however, when you say that we're thinking of different Spike quotes. Having said that I remember the line you're referring to, or think I do, and I believe it's true. It's a version of that famous Nike ad: Just Do It; something that's always appealed to me. One of the things I'd do if I were Empress of the Universe (assuming I were not too busy with nubile maidens and milk and honey and such) would be to tattoo on everyone's forehead: Oh, stop whining and just get on with it. Life can be hard, and it most certainly will be if that's what one concentrates on. Sometimes one just have to suck it up and move on.

So what graduate school are you applying to, and to study what? Will you tell us if you get in?