Kitty’s Greatest Hits (43 page)

I sent Cormac to prison as part of my project of injecting the real world as much as I could into the novels. Lots of urban fantasy novels have kick-ass, badass, gun-nut, hard-core bounty hunter type characters, and they never seem to suffer consequences. In the real world, people who kill people go to jail more often than not. So, my hard-core bounty hunter was going to get caught, and was going to go to jail.

I have gotten more e-mails and feedback over that decision than just about anything else in the series.

A lot of people worried about Cormac being in prison and gave me lots of advice about how to get him out as soon as possible, but it was never my intention to lock him away forever. I planned on bringing him back. That was why I worked so hard to come up with a situation where he’d be convicted of manslaughter (rather than the first-degree murder he’s probably actually guilty of…). He’d be out on parole in a couple of years. Meanwhile …

Where did Amelia come from? I’m a fan of Victorian adventure literature, and Amelia embodies Victorian attitudes about the occult found in a lot of those stories. I’d been wanting to write about a character like her for a long time.

Something I’ve learned: You get the most interesting results by combining the most disparate ideas in the same story. I decided the Kitty universe needed more magic and wizards, and I could accomplish that by throwing Cormac and Amelia together. That also meant that Cormac in prison would have the most
fascinating
adventures. As you can see from the books, by the time I wrote
Kitty Raises Hell
, I knew exactly what happened to Cormac, and I started writing this novella so I could get it straight in my own mind.

THE KITTY NORVILLE BOOKS

Kitty and The Midnight Hour

Kitty Goes to Washington

Kitty Takes a Holiday

Kitty and the Silver Bullet

Kitty and the Dead Man’s Hand

Kitty Raises Hell

Kitty’s House of Horrors

Kitty Goes to War
*

Kitty’s Big Trouble
*

OTHER NOVELS

Discord’s Apple
*

After the Golden Age
*

Voices of Dragons

Steel

*
A Tor Book

COPYRIGHT ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

“Il Est Né.” Copyright © 2008 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC. First appeared in
Wolfsbane and Mistletoe,
edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L. P. Kelner, Ace Books, October 2008.

“A Princess of Spain.” Copyright © 2007 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
The Secret History of Vampires,
edited by Darrell Schweitzer and Martin H. Greenberg, DAW Books, April 2007.

“Conquistador de la Noche.” Copyright © 2009 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC. First appeared in
Subterranean Online,
Spring 2009.

“The Book of Daniel.” Copyright © 2009 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
Talebones
#39, Winter 2009.

“The Temptation of Robin Green.” Copyright © 2009 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC. First appeared in
The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance,
edited by Trisha Telep, Running Press, April 2009.

“Looking After Family.” Copyright © 2007 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
Realms of Fantasy,
February 2007.

“God’s Creatures.” Copyright © 2010 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC. First appeared in
Dark and Stormy Knights,
edited by P. N. Elrod, St. Martin’s Press, July 2010.

“Wild Ride.” Copyright © 2010 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC. First appeared in
Running with the Pack,
edited by Ekaterina Sedia, Prime Books, May 2010.

“Winnowing the Herd.” Copyright © 2006 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
Strange Horizons,
October 2006.

“Kitty and the Mosh Pit of the Damned.” Copyright © 2006 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
Weird Tales
#338, March 2006.

“Kitty’s Zombie New Year.” Copyright © 2007 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
Weird Tales
#345, June/July 2007.

“Life Is the Teacher.” Copyright © 2008 by Carrie Vaughn. First appeared in
Hotter Than Hell,
edited by Kim Harrison, Harper, June 2008.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in these stories are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

KITTY’S GREATEST HITS

Copyright © 2011 by Carrie Vaughn, LLC

All rights reserved.

Edited by David G. Hartwell

A Tor
^®
eBook

Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC

175 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10010

www.tor-forge.com

Tor
^®
is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Vaughn, Carrie.

    Kitty’s greatest hits / Carrie Vaughn.—1st ed.

        p. cm.

    “A Tom Doherty Associates book.”

    ISBN 978-0-7653-2696-6 (hardcover)

    ISBN 978-0-7653-2957-8 (trade paperback)

    1.  Norville, Kitty (Fictitious character)—Fiction.   2.  Werewolves—Fiction.   3.  Vampires—Fiction.   I.  Title.

    PS3622.A9475K57 2011

    813'.6—dc22

2011013448

First Edition: August 2011

eISBN 978-1-4299-8000-5

First Tor eBook Edition: August 2011