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When I was asked to be a guest blogger by Anne Sowards, my lovely editor at Roc, I jumped at the chance. I probably would have anyway-publicity! for free!--but this is an especially good time because I actually have something to say. For the first time I have two books appearing in a single year: Embrace the Night, the third Cassie Palmer novel (April 1) and Midnight's Daughter, the first Dorina Basarab (coming to a shelf near you in October). I'm really excited about both books because each in its own way breaks new ground. But this post would be really long if I talked about both books today, so look forward to hearing about Midnight's Daughter on Wednesday.

The plot for Embrace the Night centers around a real historical puzzle: the meaning of the Ephesian letters, a six-word incantation once carved into the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus. It was one of the earliest known incantations, dating to at least the 4th century BC, was perhaps the most widespread and was reputably the most powerful. An abbreviated form of its first two words-Aski Kataski-eventually came to be used in the same way "hocus pocus" is today: as a way of referring to magic in general. But the meaning of the phrase was lost when the temple was burnt to the ground in 356 BC by Herostratus, a nutjob who hoped to be immortalized for destroying one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. He got his wish, but humankind lost a treasure. And the forgotten meaning of the Ephesian Letters became the oldest riddle in all magic.