The Belly Dancer's fresh new look

I received this lovely surprise in the mail yesterday: cover flats for the reissue of THE BELLY DANCER. I love the new artwork, don't you? Very pretty.

The release date for the reissue will be March 6, a month before DANCING AT THE CHANCE goes on sale. My editor tells me the reissue will have an excerpt of DANCING AT THE CHANCE, too, to give readers a sneak peek.

BTW, the first-round of copy-edits are done on the new novel and I've been making a list of all the wonderful things I learned about the vaudeville era and Old New York that I'm hoping to put into blog posts soon. If you're as fascinated by these early performers as I am, I think you're going to enjoy them.

Dancing at The Chance cover

DANCING AT THE CHANCE, my new historical novel about a down-and-out vaudeville theater in turn-of-the-last-century New York, won't be out till April, but the cover is ready to go. I'm so excited!

Mission Viejo Readers Festival 2011

I'll be at the West Hollywood Book Fair all day tomorrow -- mostly signing books at the Historical Novel Society/L.A. Chapter's booth -- so I have a full day of chores today. But that was no reason to entirely miss the Mission Viejo Readers Festival. I was too early any of the speakers (Molly Shannon, Cornelia Funke and Jamie Ford to name just a few), but I did have an hour to walk the grounds at the Norman T. Miller Community Center. As you can see, it's a great event.

The entrance

The balloon man in front of Within Reach Learning Center

Book Corral's booth

Giant chalkboard for visitors to write the title of their favorite book