The Preditors & Editors voting poll has opened and, as usual, people are having a hard time getting the pages to open. It’s almost like an 8th grade test website built in the 90′s. For someone who claims to have been involved with the first internet service provider, his internet providing seems to, well, suck.
I shouldn’t say anything though. He might sue. Or worse, get the SFWA to come after me.
A lot of people use the P&E website (including me, because it can be helpful), and whenever they have their annual Best Of (insert year) voting, it draws even more traffic. Traffic which invariably causes mass time out. Now, I don’t know much about the internet (except that it’s about cats and porn), but I do know that a first year college student can probably draw up something a little more efficient (and working) solution than what is up there right now.
*sigh* This is me, complaining, because I’m still bitter about my low finish with Corruptor in the voting back in 2010. I blame John Ringo, since we were in the same category (thriller).
Anyways, the P&E voting poll is up once more, and you can vote for me in Anthologies (Sha’Daa Pawns). Most of the other stuff I’ve written (i.e., just about all of it) is coming out in 2013, starting with the What Scares the Boogeyman? anthology in January. After that, I know that Dreamers in Hell is coming out either June or July; Dreams of Steam III sometime in the spring; Mental Ward II sometime this summer (an assumption); and Terror By Gaslight sometime later in the year. Then * drum roll please*…
…The Midnight Crew is being released on October 15, 2013. I may have mentioned my Christian Cole books once upon a time, but this is the first book in that series (once it’s been reorganized, that is). It’s coming out from Bad Moons Press (which, if anybody knows anything, is the name of my company) and I am super excited about this book. It’ll be available in print and ebook, with a non-DRM format (because I feel that DRM is teh evil), and will have some bonus features inside (like a sneak peak of the sequel, The Green Jewel, which is coming out in 2014).
This was an agonizing decision to go the independent route, primarily because I am cautious by nature. However, the time is right (you can thank the Penguin/Random House merger) and I feel that these books are ready (eight in total… yeah, I had that same reaction when I realized how long the series was).
Anyway, if you’re tired of always reading about “The Chosen One” and his or her “destiny”, then you’ll love Christian Cole, because he wasn’t supposed to be anything important. — until the day he chose to be a hero.
2013 Onward!
The countdown for Sha’Daa: Pawns is now on. T-minus three days until the release. If you’re wondering why I’m so excited, it’s because my story Crouching Seal, Sleeping Dragon is featured in this little anthology. Be prepared to buy it. Why?
Why not?
Spread the word. Sha’Daa is coming!
This right here? It’s because I believe in fair and justified torture of the fans.
Hello to all my new Russian friends!
Well, at least my info says that all my more recent new visitors are from Russia. Considering I haven’t been there since 1999, they must be new friends, right? Besides, it’s not like I did anything wrong in Russia… or Israel… or Turkey… and we’re not talking about Italy, so hey: it was all Rex’s fault. Well, okay, it was my fault, but that was because I assumed Rex wasn’t more naive than I was.
All right, all right. It’s my fault. I led Rex astray. I wonder how that kid’s doing these days…
I’m alive. I’m buried in books right now, both reviewing and writing, plus work has gotten intense these past few weeks. It’s going to be like this until after the holidays, unfortunately, but I think I’ll manage. I just submitted another short story, so we’ll see how that goes. I’m working on Wraithkin as much as time allows, but I’m hoping it’ll be ready to go around Christmas. Still deciding what publisher I’ll be sending it to, though Baen Books and Tor are my top two choices. Primarily because I know both publishers and like their stuff. Go with what you know, right?
I know there are three books coming out in rapid succession that I am in sometime soon. All of them, mind you, are coming out just in time for Christmas. I also noticed that Corruptor is available on the Kindle now for $3.99, which makes me very, very happy. I always felt that $5.99 for an ebook was a little too pricey. But four bucks? If people are willing to forgo a trip to McDonald’s, they can easily afford my book (and get some nuggets without breaking the bank).
Mmm… chicken…
At the risk of incurring the wrath of the book review gods (because my reviewing schedule is as steady as the men in Kim Kardashian’s life), I plan on reviewing Sygillis of Metatron (The League of Elders, Book 1) by Ben Garcia tomorrow over at Shiny Book Review. It’s a strange name, yeah, but it’s a pretty good book. It had some WTF? moments but overall was fun. I just started the sequel yesterday (sorry Ben, I’m a procrastinator) and the prologue had me giggling a bit. Only a bit. More than a bit and a man of my…. stature becomes decidedly frightening.
So I found out that I have stories in three separate books coming out in the next 90 days. This makes me giddy because that means a lot of people should be buying the books for their loved ones for Chrishannakwanzaa. Sha’Daa Pawns (Crouching Seal, Sleeping Dragon), What Scares the Boogeyman? (The Cold), and Dreams of Steam III (The Finder’s Keeper) should all be out soon-ish. I’m particularly excited about The Finder’s Keeper and Crouching Seal, Sleeping Dragon, primarily because those are writing styles I have never tried before. Okay, I might have tried them, but I never really succeeded at them until now.
Also, for those of you who are curious, my younger brother Nick made it home safely from his first deployment to A-stan. He was able to keep in semi-reliable contact throughout his deployment (the wonders of Facebook). Operation Baen Bulk sent his brigade some much-needed supplies, as well as free books (which he has torn through; voracious readers run in this little strange family). Baen Books remains one of my favorite publishers to this day (even if they haven’t published any books of mine) due to their constant and unwavering support of our troops.
Ack. First day off in a while and I’m farting around instead of working on Nightwalker. It’s… almost… done… just… a… little… more…
Seriously. Maybe 500 more words and then it’s time to edit it.
Then off to the main editor after alpha reader tears it a new one.
The Book Gods must be appeased!
Oh wow, a day off from work. I think I remember what these feel like. I’m supposed to, uh… rest? I dunno.
As I mentioned the other day, I’m waiting on two more submissions I have out right now. One of them have great chances of being picked up by the editor; the other was an experiment in voice and point of view narrative that may not be what they’re looking for. I’m fine with that, though, because they were for the same anthology and the second was written on a whim. My Alpha Reader didn’t understand it when she read it, so I suppose it’s a true experiment.
I’m so far behind on reviews right now it’s pretty horrible. I’ve got to do James Enge’s A Guile of Dragons, Clay and Susan Griffith’s The Kingmakers, and Maurice Broaddus’s King Maker (sense a theme here? I did). After that I’ll have just enough time to pack and move into my new place.
Yay. Moving.
Ugh.
I think the pace of this crazy year should be slowing down soon. It was strange. One minute it was April, the next it’s August and I’m still trying to figure out how the hell that happened. They’re right, you know. Time, as a linear concept, gets all wibbly-wobbly once you add temporal physics and old age into the mix. I just hope that I’ll have time to enjoy it before it gets too wibbly-wobbly for me to recognize.
I mean, I haven’t even had time to play Civ. That’s a serious lack of time, people, when I can’t afford the luxury of crushing my enemy AI’s into historical ashes.
Hey, someone felt sorry for me and went ahead and let my muse speak. Scary, right?
Well, here’s the link.
Also, writing. I’ll be around for a real update soon.
New anthology coming this fall that my story is featured in.
This is your warning. Prepare for the Sha’Daa, for it is coming…
Edit: the first one was not the right one. Oops.
Seriously, gatos. It's not like you'd know what to do with me even if you did catch me... which you never will, because you lack thumbs and can't unlock screen doors.
There is a male cardinal on my bird feeder right now, tormenting my kitties. He chirps, they chirp back.
The brainwashing has begun. Excellent…
Received my first royalty check last week and (I’m rich! Rich! Bite me, haters! Muwahaha!) can now buy myself dinner. Yeah, really. Authors don’t generally make a lot of money, you know? We have to have second jobs (or in my case, four, because I can’t help but to work this much) to pay off the majority of the bills.
But yeah, this check was for Corruptor, which has done surprisingly well (considering all the crap that happened leading up to the release) for being such a small little novel (little as in 120,000 words, but I digress) with hardly any publicity behind it. Of course, the first quarter in sales was the best so far, and I don’t think I’ll see those numbers ever again. At least, not until other books take off and people hear that I’d written this “other” book long, long ago.
Yes, I have delusions of grandeur. Sue me.
Still writing, still working, still reviewing. In fact, I have a review going up today over at SBR. It was a disappointing book, but I survived. Tomorrow I’ll be reviewing Allison Weir’s The Wars of the Roses. That was a much better book, though she does have one annoying habit in her writing style that nearly drove me crazy.
We’re hoping for a July release of Rogues in Hell, which features In the Shadow of Paradise, my contribution. You can see a brief snippet of it here. One of my favorite short stories to date. We’re also hoping to see both What Scares the Boogeyman? and Sha’Daa: Pawns before the year is out. Still not sure what timeframe we have for Wraithkin (75% done) or if we’re going to have a sequel for Corruptor (still debating if I want to get Obliterator published or just kill it).
I should read some more. I’ve got Robert Hoyt’s Cat’s Paw and it’s sitting there, mocking me, reminding me that I only have an hour a day or so right now of free time to read and I should be reading it. Blargh.
Okay, enough procrastinating. I swear, if it was an Olympic event I’d gold medal it every single time…
Bad news (and some good news to offset the bad).
First off, I’ve informed the concom at Mysticon that I will be unable to attend this year. Work is crazy right now, and one of my fellow workers is out with a major surgery. I was anticipating on him covering for me while gone, and with him out, I’m going to have to bow out of Mysticon. I’m… ashamed, really. I’ve never really had to cancel an appearance before. I feel like I’ve let people down (you know, those four people who liked my book?). However, I have already told them that I am going to see them in 2013 (assuming they want me, that is) and I plan on having a whole slew of books with me to autograph and sell.
Now, on to the good news…
I received my panel schedule for MidSouthCon and they look fun. I’ll announce the schedule the week before, but I can promise you that I will be having an autograph session on Sunday morning (you know, when just about everyone is hung over still?) and I’ll have copies of both Corruptor and Lawyers in Hell to sell (though with Kerlak there, they’ll be selling more books than I will be… I wonder what their royalty rates are for books sold at cons? Hmmm…).
I’ve seen the cover for Sha’Daa: Pawns (which has my hilarious action horror thriller story, Crouching Seal, Sleeping Dragon in it) and it looks awesome. It even has Kasyarna on the cover (well, sorta), which is freakin’ awesome, given as to the overall high quality of the stories in the book.
Blah. It’s 4:40 in the morning. Wow. I’m not even tired.
Time to go harass the cats.
