• “The smartest historical sci-fi adventure-romance story ever written by a science Ph.D. with a background in scripting 'Scrooge McDuck' comics.”—Salon.com
  • A time-hopping, continent-spanning salmagundi of genres.”
    —ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY
  • “These books have to be word-of-mouth books because they're too weird to describe to anybody.”
    —Jackie Cantor, Diana's first editor

THE STATE of the WICKET – HAPPY NEW YEAR, 2013!

The State of the Wicket* – as of New Year’s Day, 2013

This is a quick run-down of everything I know about that y’all might possibly want to know about. [g]

1. The cable-TV series of OUTLANDER.

a) It _is_ an agreement for a cable-TV series.

i. It is NOT a mini-series.

ii. It is NOT a movie.

iii. It is not regular network TV.

iv. Yes, if it gets made, unless you already subscribe to STARZ, you will have to pay to watch it, sorry.

b) The cable-TV series is being developed by STARZ.

i. It’s being _developed_.

ii. It’s not (yet) being _produced_.

iii. There is no casting call at present.

a. If there was one, I’d have nothing to do with it.

b. Please stop sending me pictures of your male relatives that you think look like Jamie.

c. Please stop sending me photos of yourself, even if you’re _sure_ you look just like Claire.

d. _Really_ stop sending me photos of that grotesque Irish wrestler with the clown hair.

e. Yes, Kevin McKidd, Gerard (not Gerald) Butler, Kate Winslet and Alex Kingston are all wonderful actors.

f. All these people are about twenty-five years TOO OLD to play any of the main characters in OUTLANDER.

g. Jamie is 22. Claire is 27.

h. Makeup and special effects do have limits.

c) No, I don’t know when the series will air.

i. The pilot script is still being written.

ii. The pilot script is not yet approved.

iii. If it is approved, STARZ might or might not agree to confirm the whole series or they might shoot the pilot first; we don’t know.

iv. When I _do_ know, I’ll tell you.

d) Ron D. Moore is the developer, writer, and show-runner for the OUTLANDER cable-TV series.

i. Yes, I like him.

ii. He came out to my house and spent a whole weekend with me, talking over the books, characters, etc.

iii. I believe him when he says he cares about doing a faithful (but effective) adaptation.

iv. I liked his ideas and suggestions.

v. Yes, I’ve seen the outline for the (projected) first season.

vi. Yes, I think it’s good.

vii. No, I haven’t seen the pilot script. But

e) IF the series does get produced, I can pretty much guarantee that it will have a lot of sex in it.

i. If you are one of the readers who reads the books with a black marker in hand in order to cross out naughty words and scenes of intimacy, you might want to make plans to watch something else.

2. MOBY. Aka WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART’S BLOOD. Aka Book 8 of the Main (Big Book) Series. Aka Yes, it’s about Jamie and Claire. (My Own Heart’s Blood = MOHB = MOH-B = MOBY. Geddit?) Also, it’s probably going to be fairly large. (Precedent, you know?)

a) No, it isn’t on bookshelves today, even though it –is- now 2013.

b) No, it won’t be on sale this month, either.

c) BECAUSE I’M STILL WRITING IT, THAT’S WHY.

d) Yes, it _will_ (God willing and the creek don’t rise) be published this year.

e) In the Fall, OK?

f) I live in the Northern Hemisphere. I mean MY Fall. All y’all Australians and Kiwis are smart people; I have complete confidence that you can make the mental adjustment.

f) No, I don’t have a pub date.

g) The publisher sets the pub date.

h) The publisher certainly wouldn’t set a pub date without some reasonable expectation of having a manuscript in hand by said date.

i) They don’t have a manuscript in hand yet.

j) BECAUSE I’M STILL WRITING IT, THAT’S WHY.

m) No, I can’t tell you that I will be finished writing it on X date.

n) Because it doesn’t work like that.

o) And for heaven’s sake, what possible difference could it make? (Talk about OCD…)

3. Other Stuff.

a) Novellas. There are several novellas, dealing with secondary characters from the main series. Most of these were originally written for various anthologies, but as I get the reprint rights back, are now being made available as print collections and/or standalone ebooks.

b) Which form you, personally, can get hold of easily depends where you live. Printing rights are sold and managed on a geographical basis: i.e., print rights are sold _separately_ in the US and in other English-speaking countries. In practice, it usually works out that the US and Canada have the same rights and timing, while the UK/Australia/NewZealand group of countries may have something different.

c) Now, I do urgently need to go back to writing MOBY, so I’m not writing up all the ghastly details of where/when/what about the novellas AGAIN. I’ve done it on Facebook and on my website, _and_ as a special “extra” for the UK edition of THE SCOTTISH PRISONER. You can find the complete (mind-numbing) explanation on www.DianaGabaldon.com later this week. However—

d) IF you live in the US, you can get “The Custom of the Army” as a standalone (i.e., cheap ) ebook for $1.99,

http://tinyurl.com/CustomArmy

and likewise “A Leaf on the Wind of All Hallows,” which is the story of Roger MacKenzie’s parents in WWII.

http://tinyurl.com/LeafHallows

e) IF you live in the UK/Australia/NewZealand end of things (OR you want to go to the expense of getting an imported book), you can get A TRAIL OF FIRE, which is a print volume containing both the novellas noted above, plus two others: “Plague of Zombies,” and “The Space Between” (which deals with Michael Murray, Joan MacKimmie, the Comte St. Germain, and Mother Hildegarde, among others).

f) “The Space Between” _will be_ released in the US/Canada market IN AN ANTHOLOGY (that means you should look up the title OF THE ANTHOLOGY on Amazon.com/ca, not the title of the story) in February of This Year. Right soon now. The ANTHOLOGY is called THE MAD SCIENTIST’S GUIDE TO WORLD DOMINATION. (I’ll be doing an appearance to sign this—and anything else anybody wants signed—on Feb. 20th, at The Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale, along with John Joseph Adams, the editor of the anthology.)

g) For information on getting autographed copies of any of my books, see

http://bit.ly/DianaGabaldonAutographed

THANKS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

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119 Responses »

  1. Dianna,
    Thanks for sharing and I am in agreement with everyone else.. your sense of humor is great and just reading your words puts a smile in the day., I am also Patiently waiting for MOBY. And I agree with the other person about getting Trail of Fire. it was a piece of cake and very good couldn’t put it down.. I love Jamey and John.. :D
    Noreen

  2. I thought you were going to break out into song with the chorus “Because I’m still writing it, that’s why” :-)Happy New Year to you and yours from Bonnie Scotland.

  3. Brilliant. I heart you. Xoxo.

  4. So… Does this mean you’re still writing book 8? [g]

    Thanks for keeping us updated. Happy New Year to you and yours!

  5. Thanks for the update………………..everyone should subscribe to the KISS theory (Keep It Simple Stupid!)
    As always, looking forward to the release of the book, but it won’t kill meif it takes 6mths longer than planned.
    I’m a big girl I can wait

  6. ROFL!!! Your patience is really amazing, answering again and again… I can’t even imagine HOW MANY of those kind of mails you have to receive in order to lead you into posting these answers, once more! I do hope you already have an automatic cut & paste answering system !! (g)
    Happy New Year!

  7. As a voracious and insatiable reader, I would rather wait a bit longer and have as much material to pore over as possible…Thank you for not caving to pressure and putting forth an inferior representation of our heroes/heroines!

  8. LOL>..you have SO created a huge league of mosters in us Outlander fans;) I can’t imagine any other poor author being plagued as we do you:):):) Thank you so much for the updates…they make it a LITTLE easier to bear the waits;) Happy New Year!

  9. I get a kick out of the excellent outlining skills on display here. Nice!

  10. Thanks for the update! I must tell you, I was in the UK in November after the novella book was released there and I had staff in several Waterstones branches scouring the computers to find out if they had it in and where it was and calling to other stores to hold a copy. Poor things. I was telling them a TRIAL of Fire not TRAIL! No wonder they couldn’t find it at first! I was rather miffed they didn’t have very large displays out prominently but you can’t have everything!

  11. I didn’t find your blog until after Christmas, but still enjoyed your Advent Candles stories. I am Episcopal so celebrating Advent is near and dear to my heart.

    Thank you so much for the excerpts from your next book.

    I have enjoyed the series and have learned a lot about Scotland and about the American Revolution I previously didn’t know, even though I know I studied it in school in Massachusetts.

    God Bless You for your patience.

  12. My 98 year old grandmother just finished An Echo in the Bone (audio version), that makes 4 generations of us patiently waiting for MOBY. Thanks for a great series.

  13. OK, I won’t send you pics of my daughter and her boyfriend! My daughter (who is 28!) has the hair, eyes and body type of Claire and for years I have tried to get her to read your books-she finally did 3 years ago. then last year she introduced us to her new boyfriend–as soon as I saw him I said “he is your Jamie!” He, of course did not get the reference and she had to explain it to him LOL. He is from Irish family but is a tall guy blue eyes but with more blondish red hair and he is a rugby player so most definielty has the legs for a kilt! Anyway–neither of them are interested in being actors s0 it is all moot! My own husband is more of an Ian…
    I am actually different from many of your readers–I am not in a hurry for the next book. Take your time and make it good and long is all I ask!

  14. ROFLOL!! “Makeup and special effects do have limits.” I spit coffee on my keyboard…. :)

  15. While there may not be a date for publication of MOBY set as yet, the last two Outlander books came out around September/October of 2005 and 2009 (okay, I’ve forgotten the exact dates, :P), so who knows? I’m keeping my fingers and toes (they’re a wee bit long) crossed that Diana and the publisher will be able to pull things off, if not before Halloween, at least before Christmas. BTW, Christmas is a Wednesday this year, and it seems that every time the paper or the TV news announces some author’s new book coming out, I hear it’s a Tuesday (just saying). @Diana-Please don’t yell at me for what I’ve just typed–I’m just making suppositions based on past experiences, that’s all.

  16. I can just hear the exasperation…

    I can’t WAIT for MOBY!! Super, super excited!!

  17. If we wait until fall in Australia we will be waiting forever as we do not use that awful term here. We have autumn which sounds so much better.

    • Lisa:
      I live in central Alberta, Canada. We don’t usually have fall or autumn either, we refer to it as “thud”, because our season seems to skip directly from summer to winter. *G*

      Drums of Fall, just wouldn’t sound right would it? If you ever have a chance to catch that season in Eastern Canada or the Eastern United States, you are in for a treat of glorious colour.

  18. I stumbled upon Outlander while scanning an early summer issue of People Magazine at the hair dressers this past September. The actress who played Phoebe on Friends listed it as her summer reading and gave a brief synopsis of the story, which sounded right up my alley. I’m very connected to Ireland and read a lot about it, and though I know much less about Scotland, I knew a story about 18th c. Scotland would be of interest. Not realizing it was the first of, up till now, a 7 book series, I downloaded it to my Kindle. Today I am just about to begin book 7! Had I known this was a series when I started the first book I probably would have never picked it up because I usually steer clear of book series because I just don’t like to be left hanging! In this case though, having discovered Outlander so long after it was published, I have had the immediate gratification of downloading each consecutive book right after finishing the one before. However, knowing that there will be a wait between books 7 and 8 – even a short one – has me thinking I should read this one v-e-r-y slowly!

    This series is very haunting! I have to admit that even though it is fiction, it has made the concept of linear time being an illusion, easier to grasp.

    • If you finish early: just start again with book 1 … I must have read it about 20 times in the last – omg – 30 ? years …

  19. Ms Gabaldon…I love your books and all the wonderful characters (even the bad ones), MOHB will be (I’m sure) well worth the wait. Write on…I’ll wait.

  20. You sound like you have had it, I didn’t think that people will be that unthoughtful to hound you like that…..have a healthy and a great year, leave stress behind and do your writing whenever you can….

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