Free eBook Giveaway!

In celebration of getting my first story published, I’m going to give away 2 copies of  May The Ferrymen Take You (Walk The Fire Book 2) in ePub format.

Want to read tales by Mur Lafferty, Jared Axelrod, John Mierau, JRD Skinner and others, including my short story ‘New Assignment’, for FREE? Then here’s your chance.

You have until Sunday, June 8th to respond in the comments with your favorite super villain. (Because of course. This is me.)

Monday morning I’ll select two (2) random commenters and email them a free copy of the book.

It’s that simple!

Get commenting and get your free eBook. I think you’re going to love it.

May The Ferrymen Take You (Walk the Fire 2)

No matter where you are in your writing career, there is always the next step.

For me, coming up with the next story idea is always step one. Step two is an outline of some kind. Somewhere around step three is the actual writing. But after that? It depends on your project and your particular goals.

One of my goals, the next step I’ve kept in mind, has always been to become a published writer.

And now I’ve reached that step.

 

Late last year I was asked to submit a short story for John Mierau’s new anthology, and as of this morning it is up on Amazon for sale. If you’re interested in reading something of mine, or from one of the other incredible authors that I’m sharing book-space with, pick it up today!

May The Ferrymen Take You (Walk The Fire 2)

The flames: all who step through may stride between worlds–but only a precious few, the Ferrymen, can guide you true.

From the middle ages through today, powers vie for control of the Flames. In the deep future, mankind walks upon new worlds and fleets challenge the black between galaxies–all thanks to the Ferrymen.

May the Ferrymen take you!

A shared world anthology featuring tales from WJ Davies, Mur Lafferty, Paul Levinson, Christopher Morse, Steve Umstead, Jared Axelrod, Matthew Iden, JRD Skinner, Harry Connolly and music by John Anealio.

 

 

Supervillain Corner Season 3, Sneak Peak!

The season finale of Supervillain Corner only aired a little over 3 months ago, but I’m already getting antsy to start the next one.

How about you, loyal listeners? Anxious to hear about the triumphs of Professor Brainfever and his evil crew?

I can’t say when, exactly, the new season will be posted. But I’ve started writing it, and I can’t wait for you to see what my characters have been up to.

Until then, enjoy a peak at the new logo for Season 3 of Supervillain Corner: SUPERVILLAIN WORLD!

Balticon Schedule

In a little under two weeks I will be attending BALTICON, a literature and new media convention that deals exclusively with speculative fiction. And what’s more, I’ll be attending as a guest!

‘Guest’, in this context, means ‘a person who sits on panels and pretends to know what they’re talking about, while having ridiculous amounts of fun with other guests’.

If you’re going, and want to know where to find me, my tentative panel schedule is below. Hope to see you there!

• Podcasting — Where to Begin (Panel) (Participant), Fri 4:00 PM – 4:50 PM, Derby (Hunt Valley Inn)
• Podcasting 101 (Panel) (Participant), Fri 7:00 PM – 7:50 PM, Derby (Hunt Valley Inn)
• Sound Effects (Panel) (Participant), Sat 08:00 AM – 08:50 AM, Derby (Hunt Valley Inn)
• Podcasters Against Humanity (Panel) (Participant), Sat 11:00 PM – 11:50 PM, Chesapeake (Hunt Valley Inn)
• Scientist as Protagonist (Panel) (Participant), Sun 08:00 AM – 08:50 AM, Salon C (Hunt Valley Inn)
• Good and Evil in Genre Literature (Panel) (Participant), Sun 5:00 PM – 5:50 PM, Salon B (Hunt Valley Inn)

Fictional Tears

When was the last time you cried due to the death of a fictional character?

As the years have passed and I’ve gotten older, I find it easier and easier to let fiction make me emotional.

SPOILERS TO FOLLOW

The end of On The Beach by Nevil Shute destroyed me.

The death of Eddie in The Dark Tower by Stephen King left me weeping.

The denouement of The Iron Giant gets me every…single…time.

What pieces of fiction make you shed a tear?

Easily Amused Reviews: Starla Huchton’s ‘Evolution: ANGEL’

I’m going to call any review on this site – be it a review of literature, television, film, graphic novels or anything in between – an ‘Easily Amused Review’. This is not meant to disparage the subject of my thoughts. Merely, it is an acknowledgment that I quite enjoy many things that, I have been told, are not enjoyed by a great many others. These include works of art like the 4th Indiana Jones movie, the prequel of The Thing, and Mario Puzo’s novel  ‘The Godfather’.

That being said, what I am reviewing now is super awesome! And if you don’t agree…well, this is the internet. I’m not surprised.

With that in mind, I want to talk about Evolution: ANGEL by S.A. Huchton.

The Book:

Like many of us, Candace Bristol grew up reading comic books and dreaming of becoming a super hero. Unlike most of us, her dream is about to become a reality. Accepted into the government’s AdvaNced Genetic EvoLution (ANGEL) Project, 18-year-old Candace can’t believe her good luck. But is being a super as wonderful or as simple as she expects it to be?

What I Liked:

Full disclosure: this is the first time I’ve ever read what can be classified a ‘romance’ novel. As a result I’m full to bursting with assumptions and stereotypes about the genre that are probably both untrue and unfair.

Look at my assumptions, bursting from that leather flight suit.

Luckily I’m a huge fan of science fiction, fantasy and super hero stories…all genres that suffer from similar (and generally false) assumptions and stereotypes.

Evolution: ANGEL was the perfect read for me because it fits into each one of those genres at the same time.

It doesn’t come across as a story about a relationship that is set in a sci-fi universe for no reason. It also doesn’t come across as a super hero story with a relationship and sex just for titillation.

What Huchton gives us is an intense super hero origin tale with just enough sexual tension (and sex) to make us feel like her characters are real people and not the asexual demi-gods seen so often in books or on screen.

And the sci-fi awesomeness of our heroine learning to control her hydrokinesis doesn’t suffer a bit because our heroine is also concerned about her love life.

I rooted for her in both pursuits, and I think you will too.

What I Disliked:

Evolution: ANGEL is a fast read, and that helps add to the intense experiences Candace is going through. Unfortunately the story was over far too soon for my tastes.

While I’ll avoid spoilers, I will say that the ending also seemed to be a bit too abrupt and left me with some serious questions about Candace’s choices and whether she is the hero I as the reader want her to be. I only hope that the next two books in the series address that, because I have a feeling it will make for a very interesting read.

Rating:

4 out of 5 Stars

A little short for a voracious reader such as myself, but a damn fun and steamy beginning to a story I plan on following the whole way through.

Check out more from Starla Huchton HERE.

Everyone Knows What A Vampire Is

Iconic scene from F. W. Murnau’s Nosferatu, 1922

From the Desk of Isaac Hickenbottom, P.I.

I don’t like the term ‘vampire’. It’s perfectly balanced to be both too specific and too vague, and that balance does a great job of getting people killed. How?

Well…everybody knows what a vampire is, right? Aside from certain versions shown in popular teeny-bopper movies, our cultural knowledge of the vamp is pretty consistent. They’re nocturnal undead bloodsuckers, damaged by Christian religious symbols and killed by a stake through the heart.

How is it problematic to share that information? Couldn’t it save lives?

No. Quite the opposite, actually.

Let’s ignore, for starters, that there’s an entire subculture of vanilla humans who sharpen their teeth, dress in black, drink blood and otherwise embrace the vampire name and identity. Putting a stake through one of their hearts will leave you with nothing but a heap of guilt and a murder conviction.

Instead, let’s look at one of the spookier mistakes this misunderstanding can cause.

I knew a young lady who tried to stop a vampire…what she thought was a vampire…with a glass of holy water. All she succeeded in doing was getting the creature wet and mad. Why? Because this vampire was a mandurugo from the Phillipines.

Despite having most of the same characteristics as a Classic, European or American vamp, the mandurugo is different in some very crucial ways. One is that it is completely immune to religious symbols. Christian or otherwise.

You’d have to be an expert to know that sort of thing.

But everyone knows what a vampire is, right?

That young lady thought she knew what a vampire was, and it almost killed her. She won’t make that mistake again.

So what should you do the next time you see what you’re sure is a vampire?

Run.

Leave dealing with them to the professionals. Or, at least, to those of us who are properly clued in.

But This Time There Were Robots – A Potential Anthology

An idea has insinuated itself into my mind. I can do nothing but post about it and see if anyone else is as excited about it as I am.

I was posting on social media about how last night I had written 2000 words and killed off Gaius Julius Caesar in my novel about an ironpunk Roman republic. In doing so one of my followers responded by congratulating me, but asked if Caesar hadn’t been killed a long time ago.

I allowed that he had been and then uttered the phrase that has grasped my mind in two metallic pincer-like hands for the last 6 hours.

Caesar had been killed before, I said. But this time there were robots!

 

A scene from Karel Čapek’s 1920 play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots), the first usage of the word ‘robot’

 

Now, let me be clear. I know next to nothing about putting together a short story anthology. I know next to nothing about self-publishing. Will I let that stop me? Certainly not. I can learn.

I envision an anthology of stories by multiple authors, set in different historical time periods, featuring robots big and small. Some will be friendly robots and some will be mean. Some will be very smart and others will be glorified wind-up toys. Some will have scientific reasons for their existence, and some will exist just because it’s fun.

All will be robots, and all will be anachronistic.

When I figure out how I’m going to proceed I will post again. There could be a call for submissions or a Kickstarter campaign, I’m honestly not sure. But this is going to happen.

If you’re interested in participating in what is now just an idea, let me know.

Stay tuned.

The Yearling

Shadi ran.

She had stayed as long as she could. But she didn’t want to get sick, and if she stayed she knew that it would happen. So had her father. Which is why he sent Shadi away.

“Go to the town,” he told her between racking coughs that brought up blood onto his thin blanket. “Go…warn them.”

She placed a wet cloth on his forehead and the old chief shut his eyes, soaking in the minor relief it gave him.

“What if it came from them?” she had asked. He shook his head. She could see that it took almost all his remaining strength just to move his face back and forth, but he didn’t want to be misunderstood.

“Ours boys…they brought it back. I don’t know where from. But not from the town.” Shadi’s father clutched her arm then, and it hurt. She was amazed at the strength that still pulsed through the old man. She thought, somehow, his strength was growing. That didn’t make sense, though. Did it?

“Warn them,” he choked out. “Warn everyone.”

The chief fell into another attack of coughs and then dropped into an uneasy sleep. Shadi worried if he’d ever wake again.

She packed a small satchel of food that she hoped wouldn’t make her sick, filled a skin with water that might or might not be clean and slipped her father’s rifle over her shoulder by its worn leather strap.

Shadi would have taken a horse – she was one of the tribe’s best riders – but they were all gone. When the two boys had stumbled into village early three mornings ago, bleeding and moaning like a strong wind, they had attacked anything that moved. And that meant they went for the horses. The two of them had actually managed to take one of the large animals down.

A beautiful tan yearling that Shadi had been planning to train that spring was kicking weakly in the dust and nearly dead by the time anyone knew what was happening. The boys had their faces buried in the horse’s flesh, ripping and tearing and biting at the red meat while dark blood dripped down their faces. They looked like demons in the early morning light.

The other horses had broken through the rudimentary fence that was all they ever needed to keep them in and run off. Shadi didn’t blame them. She would have done the same thing.

She was doing the same thing now. Whatever sickness those boys had was spreading. They had attacked anyone who got close enough before they could be restrained. They bit and scratched. Everyone who had helped restrain them got sick first. Then those who were trying to treat the boys’ wounds. Then those who were trying to treat the wounds of those injured by the boys.

The chief’s daughter felt fine. She didn’t know if she would get sick once she was out on the road, but Shadi knew that if she stayed it was almost a sure thing.

She gave her home one last, long look and then took off towards Coppermill.

Shadi ran.

And she was followed.

 

Read Part 1 of the story HERE.

Read Part 2 of the story HERE.

Read Part 3 of the story HERE.

The Slow and the Dead and the Fickle Author

I’m allowing myself to be fickle, and renaming my ongoing western/zombie story series. It’s NEW name is:

THE SLOW AND THE DEAD

Since I’m in the middle of writing, recording and producing season 2 of my podcast, and writing the first draft of my spy novel, I figure why not get off my duff and continue this story? And I will…soon! In 2013! I totally promise!

Read Part 1 of the story HERE.

Read Part 2 of the story HERE.

Read Part 3 of the story HERE.