(You can also read this post – or subscribe – on Buttondown.)
Hi all,
I’m so excited to show you the finished cover for IGNORE ALL PREVIOUS INSTRUCTIONS:
Tachyon Publications is sending it out on blast across all their social media accounts at the same time that I send this email – but I wanted to make sure you saw it right away!
Isn’t it cute? The art is by Elizabeth Story. I love the planet and the little robot peeking out from behind the letters. I love the Jolly Roger on the little spaceship. I love the way the handwriting-y font, on my name, softens the sci-fi aesthetic a little. We went back and forth with different versions for a while – one version had the title spelled out on a rainbow colored keyboard, which was also adorable, but we couldn’t quite get it to fit into book cover dimensions in a way that looked right.
IGNORE is also up already on Edelweiss and Netgalley – so if you’re on one of those websites and you’re dying to read and review the book before anyone else does, requests are now open! If you have reviewed my books before and you don’t end up getting a copy from one of those places, please feel free to get in touch with me directly, as I have some e-ARCs I can directly share.
And here’s the updated blurb from the press kit that my publicist at Tachyon put together:
A script supervisor for an AI media conglomerate is caught between her intense need for an orderly life and her deeper, darker queer desires. From the creator of the Outside trilogy, a heartfelt interplanetary epic of identity, longing, and a space pirate who smuggles inappropriate stories.
Kelli Reynolds loves creating stories more than anything in the world. But on Callisto, a generative AI company called Inspiration owns everything, including all the media, and only Inspiration determines which stories can be told.
Kelli has a rare and coveted job where her autism is to her advantage: She precisely edits AI output into “appropriate” stories for Inspiration’s massive TV audience. Her proudest creation is the pirate Orlando—a dashing do-gooder based on stories she used to tell friends.
Reenter Kelli’s ex-boyfriend Rowan, the person Kelli based Orlando on. Back when they were teenagers, their relationship was a secret. Kelli had thought that Rowan, a trans man, was her schoolmate Am, a girl.
Rowan is tangled up in the black market after he needed to get money for gender reassignment surgery. He needs Kelli’s help with something . . . illegal. So, now Kelli has to decide: Will she risk the safe, tidy story of her life now for the world she once wished for? What would Orlando do?
Passionate, dangerous, and tender, Ignore All Previous Instructions is a sweeping, poignant novel about censorship, forbidden love, and growing up.