It's Been Awhile

It's been awhile since I posted last, and for the few people who actually bother to follow this blog or check in from time to time, I apologize. The period from the week before Thanksgiving to the week after Chrustmas is a prolonged Hell Week at Walmart. Bitchy people, bitchier customers, management that couldn't find their asses with both hands and a road map (and that need to pull their heads out of their asses long enough to take a breath in most cases), and a generalized feeling of total hysteria amongst the employees and general populace, all gives way to a feeling that if I ever get though this I'm going to be looking fir a new job in the next year.

Welcome to my world.

But it's not all bad -except for the assholes who walk up to you and ask "Do you work here?" when you're standing there looking at them with an armload of freight, still in the boxes ready to go on the shelves, or "Can you get a game for me?" or any of a thousand other stupid questions.

"Why, no. I don't work here. I'm just picking up twenty pounds of freight because I like too."

"No, I don't work in this department just because my badge says I'm the Merchandise Supervisor. Where else would I be?"

" Who, me? No, lady, I'm stealing this shit. I suggest you grab that shit over there."

I HATE RETAIL!

If it wasn't for working nights and never having a holiday, I'd go back to working security ( it paid better).

On the only good note of the whole process, I picked up a Fuji FinePix S1500 sub-DSLR which I intend to use to shoot short story and novel cover photos with. It's a great camera and a step up from the point-and-shoot digitals I've been using for years. I cut my photography teeth on a Pentax ME and once had about $3k worth of equipment, lenses and darkroom setup, but that was long ago. This new Fuji packs in stuff I used to have in my old Pentax, like the ability to set shutter speeds and ISO's which P&S digitals don't generally have. Here's a full video feature as well as a continuous shooting mode too.

I've already produced some great shots with this camera and I'll have some great covers for my books and short stories coming soon.

BTW, if you aren't reading Dean Wesley Smith's blog, you ought to be.

Ex-Heroes

I just finished reading Peter Cline's book Ex-Heroes and I'm here to heartily recommend it.

It's a cross-genre zombie/superhero novel, but it is, frankly, absolutely awesome.

If you're a fan of zombie novels (and who isn't?) or a fan of gritty superhero genre, then this book is absolutely going to please.

I should write half as well as Cline does.

The Light Of An Oncoming Train

Just a "bye the bye", but my story "The Light of an Oncoming Train" is out today at Bewildering Stories (www.bewilderingstories.com).

Just thought you'd all like to know.

This is the introductory story for my character Quentin Dallas who is rapidly turning into one of those characters who is the most fascinating and whom you want to listen tell you his stories over and over again.

Stories Up On Stanza

My short stories The Interview and Knock On Wood are available for Stanza from Smashwords. If you have Stanza installed, just search the Smashwords catalog for "Ellis" and you'll find them (and me). My Fire On The Suns: New Technology, Volume I is also available.

I'm working on the novel Third Pulse, which will almost assuredly go up at Smashwords within a month or two, for NaNoWriMo (the original aim was for Gated, but a recent incident with my iPad resulted in the iCard Sort outline going to data heaven), and if I do not hear from Tyree Campbell at Sam's Dot Publishing within a week or so Hatchings will be released there too.

On a good note, I finally figured out what the problem was between my iPad and my netbook and got the two of them synching up again. It turns out that the netbook had apparently lost the pathway to the Apple iPad driver and I had to reinstall it.

Now, back to work on Third Pulse, which is coming along nicely - so far.

Publishing On Smashwords

I just published one of my older short stories, Knock On Wood, on Smashwords. You can grab it here for $0.99,

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/28573

I think...

I've been reading Dean Wesley Smith's blog of late and finally decided, based on the fact that he had pubb'd several short stories at Smashwords at $0.99 each, that it was time I dipped my foot in the water as well. Maybe, if I get a few hits, it'll hep me plant my lazy butt in the seat of the chair once again and finally finish a few dozen things that have been lingering for far too long.

I have several additional short stories coming out soon. A some of you know, there's The Light Of An Oncoming Train which will first see the light (pardon the pun) of day over at Bewildering Stories on November 8th. Ninety days after that the story's mine again and I'll be pubb'ing it at Smashwords as well - for $0.99 as well (so consider the pub at BWS your chance to read the story for free). In the meantime, however, I'll be publishing After Action Report and Any Minute Now and maybe a couple more stories at Smashwords.

With any luck at all, shortly after NaNoWriMo, I'll be publishing Third Pulse, a novel (superhero genre), with Smashwords (and quite possibly my FOTS (Fire On The Suns) novel as well if I can get off my lazy duff and finish the last 25k words of the first book)

I may or may not be publishing Hatchings through Smashwords, but I might do this via PubIt if a certain publisher does not answer my multiple queries within a week to 10 days or so. Certainly I will if I don't hear from him by Christmas (when your website promises 2-4 weeks for a review of a partial and then 4-6 weeks for a second review by other editors and you've waited months for any kind of response other than "We're reading it this week" (back in June when the partial was submitted in April) it seems to me I've exercised considerable patience).

Anyway, go to https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/28573 and buy the story. I could use the ego-boo (not to mention a couple of bucks to buy a beer with and give me some incentive to keep on writing).

The Light Of An Oncoming Train

I learned today that my story of the above title is due to be published in issue#407 of Bewildering Stories (an exposure only market so don't get all excited) which should be out around Nov. 8th.

Yea, me!

This is the Quentin Dallas Introductory story and was described by one critiquer over at Absolute Write as one of the best non-vampire vampire stories she'd ever read.

New Look For An Old(er) Blog (continued)

Oops!

I seem to have lost the blog roll from AW. I'll retrieve that probably sometime tomorrow.

Drat!

New Look For An Old(er) Blog

Seeing as how I completely screwed up the HTML of the old blog format for The Rumor Mill yesterday and couldn't figure out how to fix it, I decided to update the blog with a fairly simple template design rather than go back and try to retrieve everything except the stuff I didn't want.

I think it looks a little cleaner anyway.

Let me know what you think.

NaNoWriMo Countdown

It's only 29 days until the begining of National Novel Writing Month. I've already started laying in some supplies (I've learned to love those little black & white semi-hardcover notebooks you can buy at Wal-Mart for $0.77 each - i've been using them as my daily logbooks for almost 10 months now) and I'm starting to rework the outlines for my stalled projects "Gated" and "Third Pulse". I'm pretty sure I'm going to be working on "Gated" again this year as that's one of my novel ideas that really, in my opinion, has the kind of legs to really grab a publisher and an audience.

I've started using this nifty little iPad ap called iCard Sort that allows you to set up, arrange, and edit stacks of index cards. You can group the cards by specific order, rearrange the order, shuffle them around, and there are a few more bells & whistles in the program that I haven't discovered yet.

The best part is that the ap is practically made for index card outlining and it's dirt simple to figure out and use. I'm basically following Alexandra Sokolof's method fir index card outlining since the method described by James D. MacDonald just hasn't worked out for me. I'm much more of an informal formulaic kind of writer (or is that infernal?) and Uncle Jim's method of numbering, etc., all those cards is just too formal a formula for me. My first outline for a book was a series of chapter numbers followed by a 2-3 sentence description of what was supposed to happen in that chapter. I still outline that way (though, when I was running RPGs I used to use a more complex map method for plotting adventures which still works for those who lie to draw maps - I do, and did, but the method might be a little too tedious for some).

Managed to get into a conversation the other day with Mark Ellis (no relation) on Absolute Write. It turns out he's quite the author himself under both his own name and the James Axler pen name. Based on what he said I purchased and downloaded the Outlanders series book "Oblivion Stone" and that's on my current "being read" list.

Now, off to craft a few more scenes fir Gated and maybe start work on tbe future scenes for Third Pulse.

Keep your fingers crossed.

My IPad

BTW, I love my iPad. I have almost, literally, given up my Acer net book entirely in favor of my iPad. It's simply a more convenient machine to use and has a more comfortable suite of applications to use than the net book (and an awful lot of them are free and easier to use than firing up the net book and waiting while the system loads).

I still use my net book to save files and synch things up, but the iPad has become my primary working device right now.

I have 32GB wifi model with an added Virgin Mobile mifi device (which is also super-cool).

Reading As A Writer

I've noticed since I've been reading many more books recently on my iPad that I'm now reading much more as a writer than as a casual reader.

This is not to diss the casual reader, but a writer needs to read with a much more critical eye - even for pleasure - and when it becomes almost unconscious, I think you'll know at what level you and the author you're reading are writing at.

Now, without pointing fingers, I've read more than a half dozen books in the last 2 months, mainly on my iPad. The experience has varied from thorough enjoyment to wondering WTF the author was doing anyhow they managed to get the crap past an editor - and these are professionals I'mtalking about.

Again, I cannot and will not name names, but some of the stuff I've read over the past week or three wouldn't have passed my personal smell test for editorial professionalism. I'm always disappointed, as well, when an author I think I'll like literally phones the story in and completely glosses over key items such as characterization, story, scene, dialog, and even plot.

Still, they get published and paid money for their work and I literally spend years writing and crafting a work and get rejected over and over. I've literally had a work rejected for spelling blond "blonde".

Go figure.

Tastes may differ, but crap is still crap and some editorial staffs continue to put out books and pay authors for stories that are pure crap - poorly worded, poorly plotted, poorly edited, and poorly just about everything else.

Just slapping a great cover on a book doesn't mean it's a great book. A great cover and a crappy book equals a crappy book and the likelihood I'll never touch that author again.

Is Horror Dead?

That is not dead which can eternal lie, yet with stranger aeons, even Death may die.

H.P. Lovecraft

I firmly believe that this quote can be applied to horror in all its varied cloaks and disguises. True horror never really dies. It may lurk, recede from our collective consciousness from time to time, lying fallow, allowing fakes and charlatans to cloak themselves in its guise, and readying itself to come round again and blow our socks off.

It takes time for a horror author to craft a good horror story. It's not done in a day or a week or a month or even a year. True horror is a learned craft, like medicine or oil painting. It doesn't just happen and those who think they're writing "horror" all too often are writing something that touches upon horror, but is more realistically romance with trappings of things they think are horrible. Examples are Dark Shadows (the TV series, not the movies - the movie House of Dark Shadows is virtually a classic evil vampire movie full of vicious killer vampires and blood), Twilight, TruBlood, Kindred: The Embraced, and a few more. These programs and books attempt, rather openly, to disguise a classic romance soap opera by draping it with the trappings of a few hints of the horror genre. Note that all of the referenced works drape their offerings in vampirism as if vampires are the ultimate in horror.

They ain't.

In fact, Kindred: The Embraced and Twilight share so many features that I'd have a squad of lawyers chasing each other's tails if I was the designers of the original RPG or the author of the books (but we know which came first and who stole what from whom). But I digress...

Vampires are not horror anymore. They can be horrible, but the idea of vampires has so infested our cultural more's that we cannot even conceive of them as being all that horrible or "bad" anymore these days.

There are other things that affect our every day lives that are far more horrible.

The trick is to find and expand upon the genre and mythology in such a way so as to find a new way of presenting an ancient and undying idea and feeling to new readers.

We used to do it around a campfire. Then it was called a ghost story. Today we do it in books and in the theaters.

Usually badly.

Movie Review - The Zombie Diaries

Well, I finally saw the movie The Zombie Diaries yesterday. The British newspaper The Guardian rated it as "one of the best of the genre", but before I give you my review, allow me to state that this is a spoiler alert.

Spoiler alert!





Spoiler alert!





You have been warned that "Here There Be Spoilers".






In my not so humble opinion this movie is far from "the best of the genre". In fact, the movie is choppy, poorly filmed, often confusing, and misdirected into what can, by the end, be considered a sadomasochistic exercise that wasted the viewer's valuable time. It is put together as a set of poorly- and confusingly-related video diaries which appear to have been filmed by an amateur cameraman attempting to splice together another Blair Witch Project. In many cases the film so closely resembles BWP that it is obvious that the director was extremely heavily influenced by that film (not that I cared much for BWP either).

The film begins with a brief montage of a military platoon cordoning off and clearing the outbuildings of a farm. A pair of guys in biological protection suits examine a body on the side of the road and remove something from it. The film then switches to 12 hours earlier and follows the apparent outbreak of some kind of viral plague in China and a TV film crew as they head out of London to visit a farm where the farmer has apparently been forced to slaughter his chickens and has lost his livelihood. Leaving London, one of the lead male characters is informed by his producer that something appears to have happened in New York City, but he cannot quite determine what yet. As the crew arrives at the farm they find it apparently deserted, but their car breaks down as they attempt to leave and, of course, the two female characters and the cameraman wander off to the also-apparently deserted village nearby in search of help as their cell phones are not working. Shortly thereafter they return to the farm where the other male character receives a phone call (Huh, what? The phones weren't working just a short time ago at the farm, right?) stating that something has happened in London, 3/4ths of the city have been blocked off, and the hospitals are filling with victims of the virus.

The crew breaks into the farmhouse where they find the body of the dead farmer and are attacked by his apparently zombified wife or daughter. They then return to the village where they encounter and escape several more zombies.

The film then switches to a month later where several survivors are on the road attempting to retrieve supplies. The cameraman is apparently the only survivor of the earlier TV crew. This group narrowly escapes another group of zombies (these are the slow kind) outside a food store, and return to their sanctuary. There is a choppy nighttime scene, intended to be using night vision cameras, as the survivors fight off a group of zombies attacking them across an open field. The survivors, instead of fighting from a fortified position, engage the zombies with their guns, at night, in the open field, with flashlights illuminating the key figures (can we say let's destroy one's night vision), and some of the fighting gets within hand-to-hand range.

As I recall, because at this point I'd probably had one beer too many which is the only way I managed to watch this entire piece of crap, the film switches again. This time, we have the same, sort of, group of survivors with one or two new members. Several of them are again on the road while one of their leaders has gone off by himself. The group is hunting supplies on foot, find a body, check it (but not thoroughly enough), and declare the thing dead. As they move on they are attacked by the zombie and one of them is bitten. They jump in their vehicle and attempt to escape, but run into another group of zombies and have an accident. One of the female characters is knocked unconscious and the three men with her, one of whom is bitten remember, leave her behind in the car where she is eaten alive. On foot, the men attempt to escape through the woods, but the injured man is unable to go on and they kill him as he sickens further (as they should have earlier). The survivors manage to make it back to their camp where there's a confrontation, shot at night using night vision, between the leaders.

The next morning, two of the group move out to investigate the far side of the forest that the zombies have been coming from (crossing that open field mentioned before). Here they find the deserted farm from earlier in the movie (surprise!) and move in to investigate. They find one of the female TV reporters from the earlier video diary, naked, zombified, and tied spread-eagle in a stall inside the barn (you can guess what she was being used for).

From this point on the film switches back to a short segment of two, apparently Middle Eastern, men who joined the group a short while before. There is a segment where one of the men is apparently torturing a zombie by cutting off his finger joints one by one which was filmed by the cameraman earlier. Discovered, the villains set about killing the male survivors and tying up the females for their own private usage.

By this time I am thoroughly hammered, not to mention extremely tired of this pile of crap so I'll spare you the final details. Let's just say that no one wins in the end.

Overall, this is a poor film, hardly among "the best in the genre" unless one completely fails to understand the zombie genre in the first place (which The Guardian's reviewer apparently did). It is badly-scripted, horribly acted, shabbily shot, and has a plot line so inconceivably imagined it boggles the mind how it ever managed to make it to DVD though, luckily, it was never shown in US theaters as near as I can tell. Oh, and the DVD cover shot which shows zombies wandering through London near Big Ben? It's never even seen in the movie. Even the movie Lifeforce had the decency to show us a few London locations being overrun by the alien vampires.

Two big thumb's down on The Zombie Diaries. At $7.50 that's 3 less beers I could have had this week (hmmm, a rating system based on the number of beers the movie cost me? That might just work... - a 3 beer movie (meaning you'd better have 3 beers in you before watching it)?).

What Makes A Story "Good"

New writers and not a few more experienced writers often come against the dilemma of "Is my story any good?".

What constitutes "good"?

Well, a few people from over at the Analog forum have come up with a list of what makes a story "good".

If it makes you want to turn the page or read the next paragraph and it keeps going on like that, it's a good story.

If it makes you laugh somewhere along the way, it's a good story.

If it makes you think somewhere along the way, it's a good story.

If it makes you wake up in the middle of the night and reach for it, it's a good story.

If it keeps you awake long after your regular bedtime, it's a good story.

If you find yourself talking about it with your friends, it's a good story.

If you find yourself looking for it online or at the library or a book store, it's a good story.

If you find yourself re-reading it for the second or third or tenth time, it's a good story.

If it makes you lose yourself in it for an hour or a day or week and forget the cares of the day, it's a good story.

Marian added that "If it makes you remember it years later, it's a good story".

Conestoga 14 Report

Well, a visit to Conestoga 14 this morning and this afternoon might (remember might) have paid off. I put a partial for Hatchings into the hands of Tyree Campbell, editor and publisher of Sam's Dot Publishing this morning and he asked to see Night On A Boat (my short Quentin Dallas vignette) in an email Monday.

This evening I met Travis Taylor and during our conversation he offered to give me a copy of his book on planetary defense (which sells on Amazon for $35). I turned the offer down, of course (stating that I appreciated it, however), but if I see him tomorrow morning I might just take him up on the offer (probably not; I'm far too polite for my own good sometimes).

I haven't seen S.M. Sterling yet, and naturally I expect a rejection from Mr. Campbell (even though he complimented me several times for knowing how to format a manuscript and to use commas) and after saying he wouldn't read the partial and synopsis during the Con when I left he was sitting there reading it anyway (he thought the idea of a secret government agency buried inside FEMA was a remarkably plausible one).

So, for what it's worth, and the remarkably short time I've actually had to spend at the convention, it was well worth the $35 registration fee. I just wish I could have stayed for the "meet & greets" and the parties tonight (I don't see too well at night these days (badly need new glasses) and I have a taillight and a rear blinker light out so driving at night is only done on as as-needed basis).

So, all-in-all, it looks like the July epub date for Hatchings is off the table for the moment (though I need to dive into that final, final, final edit again and git 'er done).

Covers

Cover designs can be an important part of your book, possibly as important as the writing inside those covers. After all, what attracts you a book first aside from the name of the author? The cover, right?

Here's another cover design I'm toying with for the book,



The original cover, which was done by a friend over at Absolute Write is on another computer and I'll amend this post later to show it.

Here's the other cover design,



So, which one do you like best?

Rejection & Depression

Every time, every time I submit something I'm absolutely sure it's going to be rejected. I'm a hack and I'm proud of my hackness. I've been told by a professional (associate) editor that it would be years before I was writing at a professional level.

But, I've had 3 short stories published by the same online 'zine and they're a pretty big venue (and very well-respected for the most part). Yes, they're a nonpaying venue, but do I give a rip? Nope. I'm gaining a reputation there.

Every single time I get something published out there wherever by whomever for whatever I'm putting my stories out there to entertain people and more people are getting to know me and my writing. That means that eventually people will start to watch for stuff I write - and maybe even buy it now and then.

Every time I get something published I think of that editor and say to myself "See what you missed, a$$hole? You tried to discourage me and to extinguish my career before it had even started. This is my payback for that."

Starting small and working up? I can live with that. Starting and stopping altogether? No way. I have been writing since I was in my pre-teens. I'm now past 50. I've published a buttload of non-fiction in various venues, but I've never had a story or novel professionally published. I might never see that happen. Does that mean I'm going to stop writing?

Not just "No", but "Hell, no!"

Just the mention that I'm going to self e-publish a book this July made an acquaintance of mine at my day job happy. He's as anxious about seeing the book come out as I am (which surprised the daylights out of me) and he's happier about it than I am because there is a great deal of trepidation I feel about this particular venture.

But he's going to tell 2 people and they;re going to tell 2 people and so on and so forth.

My writing's going to make someone else happy. It already has and that person hasn't even read the book yet.

Yours will too - if you stick to it long enough.

It's hard. It's dirty. It's cutthroat, and it's inefficient - but if you've got the bug for writing you cannot ever lay it down.

If you can walk away, you should. But think about those people you might disappoint, those people who will never be delighted just to hear that you have a story or book about to come out.

Can you walk away from them?

It is a wonderful thing to be able to inspire delight, anticipation, and yes, hunger, in another human being with your imagination.

So, when discouragement and depression, and rejection get you down, remember the guy I told you about above. He could be anyone you know. He could be a lot of people you know. You have stories to tell. Tell them and forget about everything else.

You may not be a master today, but who is? It takes years to become a master in any field. Be a hack instead and tell stories that delight and entertain and thrill.

Another Story To Be Published

I just received word today that my story The Light Of An Oncoming Train is going to be published by Bewildering Stories. Both Don Webb and Bill Bowler (Managing Editor and Publisher) at BWS replied to my query from Thursday regarding the status of this story.

While BWS is a non-paying market, it is probably one of the best exposure markets going on the web today in y not so humble opinion. I've had 2 other stories published by BWS in the past (The Meadow and Knock On Wood) so I am justifiably proud of the stories that have appeared there. I think The Light Of An Oncoming Train is one of my best (and the Horror Hounds over at Absolute Write seem to think so as well) and it introduces a character, Quentin Dallas, who has become one of my favorites. I currently have 2 additional Quentin Dallas stories written and another 2 in the works so I expect you'll see more of him in the future.

You can visit BWS at http://www.bewilderingstories.com/

I'll be letting everyone know here and elsewhere when the story goes up on BWS's schedule.

Open Invite - eBook Reviews

I'm sending out an open invite. Anyone who would like a review of their new ebook can email me a copy and I'll review it asap here on this blog.

I doubt I'll get a lot of hits initially, but I imagine I'll get one or two here and there. In addition, I cannot promise to do this indefinitely or as a full-time career (I do have a day job after all).

Regardless, if you send me a copy of your ebook to fotsgreg@aol.com I promise I'll do the best job I can to review your book here asap.

Here are the conditions, though (you knew I'd get to conditions eventually).

My reviews will be honest. They might even be harsh at times. I expect the authors to be adults and to not take offense at anything I say in my review of their work.

My review is my opinion. Please do not take offense. Opinions are like... and we've all got one and they pretty much all stink. Be professional about your writing and your responses. Please remember James D. MacDonald's advice "Never respond to a negative review". I do not exist and nothing I say about your writing is ever going to make you less of a writer or less of a person than something you say.

I'm not a professional reviewer, but I know what I like and what I don't. I'll review your ebook for free. I will not edit it and I will post my opinion of it here. You pays your money and you takes your chances.

Let the games begin.

All The Drama, None Of The Waiting

Okay folks, I haven't posted here in quite some time because I've been working on other things not to mention working in real life. In the meantime I've managed to get quite a bit of work done on a couple of works in progress, signed up for a Google AdSense and AdWords, it made a couple of decisions regarding a couple of works that have been in progress for far too long.

As my previous post might have indicated, I've basically come to the decision that the current wait of a year or two to write a novel then a year or two to find an agent or publisher then a year or two to see that novel published is simply far too long for me to wait.

Yes, there are those who would say that this is just part of paying one's dues, but the simple fact is that for me a six-year wait to do anything more to get anything accomplished is pretty much intolerable. If I have to wait another six years to get a book published it's not going to happen. I will have moved on to other methods for getting the things I write out in print or some other method of getting them to the public.

Honestly, I think that waiting 12 weeks for a short story to be reviewed and decided upon as far, far too long. That book, once it even enters the publishing pipeline, that is upon acceptance, cannot be expected to be printed for about two years is almost as intolerable.

Now, I know the publishers have a lot of things on their plate and publishing is a time tolerant business. It's also monetarily expensive business and a massively expensive business, and I've got some experience doing editing and wading through slush piles so I don't envy editors at professional houses their jobs whatsoever.

I guess, however, for me, that some of the comments I've received from editors and publishers and agents and some of the things that I've seen regarding a person's chances of being published in the traditional fashion have me saying and thinking to myself that it is a complete waste of my time and effort to go through the traditional route. Now, I've been told that I am still years away from being professionally published (by an editor, naturally), but I don't choose to believe that sonofabitch. If what he said were true, it might be that I should wait those years to be professionally published, but quite frankly I don't have that many years of absolute faith in a system that is obviously badly broken already left in me. I'm 50 years old, an asthmatic, with bad knees and arthritis. I'm also an impatient curmudgeon who has very little patience with inefficiency and ineptitude.

So, I've decided that by the second quarter of this year I will release my first book as a self published e-book. I don't know who I'll be distributing it through yet, but I definitely will be distributing it off of this blog site for starters. some of you out there might begin to see ads for the book Hatchings run by Google AdWords soon. That would be mine.

Hopefully, some of you out there might even buy and enjoy the book which I will be pricing at much less than MacMillan's suggested retail price for an e-book starting at $15 were even Amazon's suggested retail price.

In the meantime, I'll be trying another experiment here on the blog in which I will be releasing chapters of my space opera novel Fire On The Suns, prior to what I hope will be a release for it sometime later on this year.

I've already got a good cover for Hatchings and a pretty damn good cover for Fire On The Suns as well. I don't think these are your typical e-books they've been edited, revised, and edited again and again, not just by me, but by other volunteers as well. While I don't expect these books to make or set a new standard in e-books, I do expect that they'll set a standard that you will come to enjoy in my writing and that you will enjoy. I have been told that they are both very Heinleinian in tone and, to me, that is a high honor. I hope you will find them enjoyable when they finally come out.

Look for Hatchings, as I said, by the second quarter of this year and Fire On The Suns by the fourth.