Mechanical Omphaloskepsis

om·pha·lo·skep·sis. noun \ˌäm(p)-fə-lō-ˈskep-səs\ : contemplation of one’s navel as an aid to meditation; also : navel-gazing

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The title of this entry is a tag that I first started using on LiveJournal. From an entry dated May 28, 2008:

My dear friend Sunil Sebastian suggested someone in the new novel have a bionic navel. To which I was forced to reply:

Navel-gazing Retrofuturistic NeoVictorian = LintPunk

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This is all lead-up to say that I have been daydreaming and costuming steampunk for some time now. I have also been writing a particular book for some time. It features a young girl named Penny Farthing, who zips about the city of Bazalgate on a motorized velocipede. I think, to date, I have written six significantly different versions of her story.

THIS is the one that sold to Amazon’s new YA imprint Skyscape:

In case you have trouble with the fine print, that’s:

Lisa Mantchev’s TICKER, about a girl with a faulty clockwork heart whose dark family history draws her and her friends into a NeoVictorian conspiracy involving terrorist Ray Ban outlet bombings, human augmentation, and the world beyond the veil, to Miriam Juskowicz at Skyscape, for publication in October 2014, by Laura Rennert at Andrea Brown Literary Agency (World English).

I am thrilled this. Thrilled I will be able to share her story with you. Thrilled that my sister, who has always been one of my biggest supporters, will see “her” book in print.

Best of all? SHOES. Because I promised myself a pair of Fluevogs if we sold this. ADORABLE STEAMPUNK SHOES, HERE I COME.

And mind the confetti… it’s made of cogs and gears and shiny pointy pokey watch bits!