Civil War Horror

Over at Smashwords I'm participating in their great summer/winter sale. Whether you're sweltering in the summer of the Northern Hemisphere, or chilling out somewhere south of the Equator, it's always a good time to read an ebook. Through July 31, all my ebooks at Smashwords are 50% off. You can see an entire list on my Smashwords page.

The books include my Trench Raiders World War One action series, each now $1.50; older works such as the short story collection The Night the Nazis came to Dinner and the historical fantasy The Quintessence of Absence, both $1.50; and my Civil War horror novels A Fine Likeness and The River of Desperation.

Use the coupon code SSW50 at checkout to save 50%!

Some of you may be familiar with the blog Writing in the Crosshairs, written by author Roland Yeomans. If you don't read Roland's blog regularly you might have missed the fact that he's going into cancer surgery today.

I was trying to think of a way to cheer him up all the way over here in Spain and hit upon a buy-a-thon for his books. I've been reading Her Bones are in the Badlands and enjoying it immensely since it's set on a silent film set and I'm a fan of early movies. Today I bought French Quarter Nocturne, in which some strange beasts arise in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. This one should be interesting because Roland is not only a cancer survivor, but also a Katrina survivor.

So if you'd like to read some interesting speculative fiction and make a writer's day, check out his Amazon page. What could cheer a writer up more than coming out of surgery and finding his Amazon rankings have shot up?

I've decided to change the blog a bit. You may not have noticed that I widened the center a tad to make for easier reading and larger photos. I've also added my Twitter feed on the righthand column. The biggest change, of course, is that I've replaced the templates bookshelf background with a photo of Civil War soldiers shooting down a pterodactyl!

I've written a few posts on the mythological Thunderbird and the various soldiers and frontiersmen who claimed to have bagged one. My hard drive contains a small collection of these photos and I might make a tiled background of them when I get the time. I certainly would have to include this charming photo of a Globster!

Today I've invited blogger buddy A.J. Walker to talk about his new fantasy novel, The Maze of Mist. I've guest blogged for his Medieval Mondays series several times on topics such as medieval handgonnes and medieval weapons in the Civil War, so it's great to have him here. He's going to talk about using real cultures in fantasy fiction. Take it away, A.J.!

Fantasy fiction is a blend of the familiar and the strange. The familiar helps the reader construct a framework for envisioning the story. It's no surprise, then, that most high fantasy settings are reminiscent of medieval Europe. Writers usually pick medieval England, France, and the Norse region as their settings, and while I love all these cultures, I've always felt there were plenty of others that were being underused.

For my Timeless Empire series, the setting is reminiscent of medieval Spain. That makes it a little different than your typical fantasy novel, but still familiar.

I went further afield with The Maze of Mist. The protagonist, Metis Itxaron, is a mixed-race prince, the son of a goblin mother and a human father. Goblinkin culture is a mix of Native American, the peoples of the Caucasus Mountains in Georgia, the prehistoric Kurgan culture, and a fair amount of my own weirdness. The human culture is medieval European. I wanted something for my reader to find familiar!

I also throw in a new race, the mysterious Amhara from beyond the Southern Sea. These explorers have solved the mystery of the Maze of Mist, a strange labyrinth of fog that has baffled navigators for all of recorded history. For this culture, I borrowed some of Sean's experience and made them Ethiopian. If you're a regular reader of Sean's travel writing you know he's a regular visitor to that ancient land and has even written a book about Ethiopian history.

So why Ethiopia? Because as an archaeologist I know this land is home to one of the oldest and most advanced civilizations in the world. Even Heroditus lists it as one of the great cultures of his time. Yet it is almost entirely ignored in Western history books.

The kingdom of Abyssinia went through several different incarnations that had several similarities. The land was made up of several tribes and held together by a ruler that did not have absolute power except in times of dire emergency such as a foreign invasion. Women enjoyed a relatively high status and compared to medieval Europe (although there weren't female warriors like I have in my novel) and studies such a geography, painting and literature were highly developed.

When my protagonist goes off with these newcomers on a diplomatic mission, he gets to sample their food and drink, learn about their world view, and generally immerse himself in their culture. He's not just journeying across an ocean, he passing from one culture to another. The ancient Abyssinian kingdoms are a perfect model for a civilization that your typical fantasy character would find both strange and alluring.

Plus they had cool swords and strong booze. You gotta have cool swords and strong booze in a fantasy novel!


Thanks, A.J.! Do you have a new release you'd like to shout about? Go to the How Can I Help You? page to learn how, well, I can help you. . .

Hello from Oxford! Wait, wasn't I in Valencia? Why yes I was. Hard to keep up with me, isn't it? My family and I are enjoying our usual summer working vacation here in Oxford, where I'll be researching some magazine articles and writing fiction, and my wife will be working at the astronomy department. My son will be at a great daycamp he's been going to since he was three.

If you look at my blog roll, you'll see a new addition. Roads to the Great War is an excellent new blog about World War One run by the same folks that gave you the World War One website. With the centennial coming up next year they've decide to do a blog! If you like military history, check them out.

Speaking of blogs, I have another guest post up on the Black Gate blog, this one about Spanish Castles reused during the Spanish Civil War. I have two more posts in the pipeline for them, this time about an Italian castle.

Oh, and don't forget you can still get my fantasy novella The Quintessence of Absence free on Smashwords. Please blog, tweet, and share!

I have decided to offer my fantasy novella The Quintessence of Absence as a free ebook. It's now available on Smashwords in all formats. Since I'm not in the Kindle Select program, I can't make it free on Amazon unless someone reports a lower price to them (hint, hint).

I've never done a free promotion before so I want to ask my fellow indie publishers--what's worked for you? I've already done the usual FB and Twitter announcements. What else can I do besides plea for a bit of your blog and Twitter time? Of course, I'm assembling the next Reader News post, so if you have anything you'd like to share, I'd be happy to reciprocate.

This dark alternative history novella was originally published in Black Gate magazine. I'm hoping this free promotion will boost sales on my other fiction. By the way, if you were one of the kind folks who bought a copy before it went free, drop me a line at the email address you see on the sidebar and I'll send you another, as-yet-unpublished story as a thank you.

A blurb is below:

Can a drug-addicted sorcerer sober up long enough to save a kidnapped girl and his own Duchy?

In an alternate 18th century Germany where magic is real and paganism never died, Lothar is in the bonds of nepenthe, a powerful drug that gives him ecstatic visions. It has also taken his job, his friends, and his self-respect. Now his old employer has rehired Lothar to find the man's daughter, who is in the grip of her own addiction to nepenthe.

As Lothar digs deeper into the girl's disappearance, he uncovers a plot that threatens the entire Duchy of Anhalt, and finds the only way to stop it is to face his own weakness.

My fantasy novella The Quintessence of Absence has been out barely a week and it's already garnered its first review.

Kathleen Keenan gave it five stars and said:

"The Quintessence of Absence" features a seriously flawed protagonist--Lothar, a wizard who is addicted to nepenthe (a bit like opium). Lothar is reluctantly drawn into a mission to rescue his former employer's daughter, who has mysteriously disappeared. Lothar's addiction threatens to waylay him, but no more than an assorted cast of wizards, evil nobles, and other nepenthe addicts.

"The action is nonstop, and the author skillfully draws the reader into an alternate history that might have been our own if magic were real. The only real flaw in this lively fantasy is that it is too short. I was disappointed when I reached the end, which is my criterion for an excellent read."

That just made my day!

I'm proud to announce that my latest fantasy novella, The Quintessence of Absence, is out now on Amazon, Smashwords, and will soon be at other outlets as well. This 25,000 word story originally appeared in Black Gate magazine. A blurb is below:

Can a drug-addicted sorcerer sober up long enough to save a kidnapped girl and his own Duchy?

In an alternate 18th century Germany where magic is real and paganism never died, Lothar is in the bonds of nepenthe, a powerful drug that gives him ecstatic visions. It has also taken his job, his friends, and his self-respect. Now his old employer has rehired Lothar to find the man's daughter, who is in the grip of her own addiction to nepenthe.

As Lothar digs deeper into the girl's disappearance, he uncovers a plot that threatens the entire Duchy of Anhalt, and finds the only way to stop it is to face his own weakness.


The cover is by fellow indie writer Jack Badelaire, author of the awesome Commando series. He saw my struggles with designing a cover and sent me this one to me out of the blue. Now that's the indie spirit!  You can read his take on the indie life in an interview here.

I'd love to have some help getting the word out. Please tweet, share, and blog about this release. But if you're considering buying it, please jump the cut.

Next week I'll be releasing a dark fantasy novella titled The Quintessence of Absence, a reprint that originally appeared in Black Gate magazine. Set in an alternative 18th century Germany, it deals with a struggle between good magic and the darkest regions of the occult.

I decided to try designing my own cover for a change and used the free template software at Copysafe. Here are some I've come up with. Which do you like?

Cover #1

The templates are a bit rigid. For example, I can't center this byline. But hey, it's free!

Cover #2

Cover #3

Cover #4

So which one do you prefer, numbers 1, 2, 3, or 4? (Oh, and those white boundaries are a product of blogger. They won't be on the actual covers)

That's right, I'm giving away two copies of A Fine Likeness on Goodreads. If you haven't read my book, or simply want a print copy, here's your chance to win one of two copies for free! Deadline is December 15. This is available only to members of Goodreads, which is kind of like Facebook for avid readers without all the annoying privacy issues that are really, really tempting me to ditch Facebook.

So sign up for your chance to win a copy. And while you're at it, why not friend me at my Goodreads page?

Black Gate has just published my historical fantasy novella The Quintessence of Absence, about a young wizard in the grip of addiction who discovers his drug of choice is at the center of a sorcerous conspiracy.

It was accepted and paid for five years ago, and now my long wait is over. Sad to say, Black Gate recently stopped doing a print edition. It would have been nice to see it on a dead tree, but I suppose given the website's popularity my story will get more readers this way.

Happy reading!