Tag: preview

Staying relevant …

Another teaser from Elbert.

Novi Sad, Serbia

After a week visiting Serbia’s second-largest city, Adele was ready to move on. The Danube river valley was enchanting, but a movement to fold the province into the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was showing signs of being more controversial than advertised.

 She told him twice, “Let’s leave before the shooting starts” — but he was on a mission, dispatched by the Prefect of the SagGha, and their brief stop on the way to Jivada was turning into something else entirely.

Stefan’s mother, Jivada-born, ostensibly Hungarian, didn’t think there’d be a fuss over Serbia’s shifting borders. “What you and I need to worry about is how to counsel our husbands when they start alienating friends and relatives over this conspiracy business.”

Adele was cautious. “Will AjJivadi here be divided over it?”

“Of course, they will.” She led them to a barn where Adele’s Bugatti coupe was soon to fly in from Zurich, unpiloted. “Guru Orsa is naïve to think we’ll smuggle in Star Forge phosphates, double our farm production, feed Europe and Jivada, and nobody will notice. We’ll be exposed, and if we aren’t of one mind about what to do then …” They gazed together at a sky full of stars and uncertainty. “All will be lost.”

Getting her car back turned out to less of a pleasure than Adele expected. My mother-in-law is on the wrong side.

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Another teaser from W.I.P.

Wine Country, France

Charlotte woke with a chime in her ear, a message from Roy saying he’d pick her up in 45 minutes — not the notification she expected, from a ride-hailing service, scheduled for an hour before dawn. Radium-painted hands on an alarm clock said it was shortly after 4:00 AM. Momo was breathing softly, dead to the world — and whatever opportunity there might have been for a passionate goodbye was out the door.

She gathered up her clothes, crept into the parlor, dressed under her drones’ watchful eyes, thought about subvocalizing a reply and changed her mind, deciding to call from the kitchen. Roy sounded chipper, like he’d been up for an hour. “Hey, boss-lady; do you have clothes for Boston?”

“What’s in Boston?”

“A railroader.”

“Oh; that guy.” Her eyes wandered to the table, where she found a note next to a white tube made from card stock. “Are we going to shoot him, or what?”

“Echelon wants us to ask a few questions first.”

Continue reading “Another teaser from W.I.P.” →
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Undiscovered, but improving

I had a post occupying this spot until yesterday. I kept the headline because it signified what I originally intended to talk about, but the rest was an embarrassment — and not because I failed to express myself. No, I had my skirt over my head all right, displaying a poor attitude, complaining that after 4 novels published and 50 units sold, I’d only garnered 11 reviews.

But then I realized, considering how little I’ve done to promote the work, that might be an acceptable ratio — and the reviews were encouraging.

Joshua Grant described The Illusion of Gravity as ‘Sci-fi with substance’. Mary Jo Fletcher doesn’t read SF, but she enjoyed the book. (Mary’s a friend; I’m sharing it anyway.) Everyone liked Silken Thread (adventure/love story), although I’m told it was too fast paced, and the hero didn’t fail enough. Joshua Grant again weighed in on Resilient, praising the book for action, depth, an immersive quality, and creative use of linguistics — that last observation just tickling the heck out of me, because it’s something I think I have an ear for.

If one isn’t selling a lot of books, the Amazon dashboard allows authors to observe the habits of Kindle patrons. You can witness a reader giving up after X number of pages, which I haven’t seen a lot of. What I have seen is The Illusion of Gravity consumed in one sitting, followed by the next two books over a period of 3 days, then Silken Thread — again, in one sitting.

Continue reading “Undiscovered, but improving” →
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Ghana, 1929

Another teaser from my WIP novel Elbert.

January, 1929. Broken Claw enforcer Stefan Tot takes our heroine Charlotte Banks along on a delivery run.

Nasia Basin, Ghana

The 5,000-kilometer flight into northern Ghana took all of five minutes, after which the shuttle dallied above the landing zone while Stefan and his men debated what to do about three locals squatting next to their truck.

Charlotte listened to the discussion with one ear, attention focused on the feed from a Raksa drone sent down to spy on the interlopers. Stefan chose his words carefully — mindful, she thought, of the pilot’s sensibilities. “They’re up to no good, but I don’t want to shoot them over something like this.”

She smiled to herself. You would, if it was just us. “What do we have to trade?”

Continue reading “Ghana, 1929” →
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How to buy a flying motorhome on Jivada

Another work-in-process teaser, this one from Elbert, the first book in the Anye Constituency series. Illustration by Khoi Anh

Badari

The seller was a goat farmer, living on the rocky north coast not far from the SagGha temple where Guru Orsa disembarked the day they met him. He was Mahat Limar, talkative, apparently richer than King Midas, having a leasehold spanning a huge tract of land dotted with feed stalls and animal shelters.

The travel coach was kept in a barn, a space dedicated more to veterinary science than goat hospitality, but there was community on hand. Charlotte would have taken one home if she had a place to keep it. “This female is adorable!” Continue reading “How to buy a flying motorhome on Jivada” →

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Thought experiment …

I wrote a 9,700 word short story, a consequence of thinking ahead to Book 6 in the Anye Legacy series. It’s now making rounds at the SciFi monthly magazines for publication.

Rendezvous at the Lazy L

In 1920s South Dakota, a small-town physician learns that a local dude ranch is a destination for offworld tourists.

Black Rock, South Dakota — 1928

Francine Suraksin dallied at the gift store’s liquor display while her husband mooned over a Winchester rifle, a rite of departure he observed each season. The concessionaire — a tough-looking ex-policeman, ethnic Anye Kopin, pelt shaved so tight you could see skin — got to the point. “Buy it. You aren’t coming next year.”

That was a fact; after seven hundred years of adventure tourism along the retracement of 84 light-years previously untraveled since the Bronze Age, a time had arrived when non-humans could no longer risk dropping into the hills for calf-roping lessons, nature hikes and steak dinners. Continue reading “Thought experiment …” →

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Naked self-promotion

My Anye Legacy eBooks are finally starting to move!

According to reviewer Josh Grant at Diabolic Shrimp, the first book is “Sci-Fi with substance” with “Great action and intrigue”. Would that Josh had read all 3 – he could have said, “Literary SF, epic plots, thoughtful storytelling for grown-ups” or something like that. Not that I would coach anybody – although if you buy the books and say nice things on Amazon, I will not be offended.

Here’s the call-to-action – I need reviews and a boost in sales ranking on Amazon, else my work will never rise in the search lists enough to be noticed.  You can help by sharing my WordPress URL. What the heck – it’s only a click, and I promise not to embarrass you. The books are written-to-inspiration, rather than written-to-market, and some people think they’re pretty good.

Thanks for reading. We need you. Keep doing it. Comments welcome.

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Blurbed.

It is said that it’s a waste of time to do much in the way of marketing until one has at least 3 books to sell. Well, I now have 4 books published, so I suppose it’s time to review the essays I’ve been hoarding on my bookmarks bar. You know the ones – “How to turn your inane ramblings into a #1 Best Seller in 5 easy steps.” 

Fortuitously, Ricardo Fayet over at Reedsy sent me an email the other day – me and probably 150,000 other people, not that I’m complaining – entitled The Ultimate Guide to KDP: How to Succeed on Kindle Direct Publishing. I’ve seen this advice elsewhere – but it’s neatly organized and, as far as I can tell, all the salient points are covered.

Number 1 – Create a polished cover.

I think I have that, even though I didn’t use Paul Trif at TwinArtDesign for Silken Thread, choosing to do that one myself. I know – that’s often a mistake. Paul made 3 great covers for my Anye Legacy books and there’s no reason to think he wouldn’t do it again. Be sure and tell me if you think I’ve goofed on this one, otherwise I’ll blissfully move forward not knowing any better. Continue reading “Blurbed.” →

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Places I’ve been, revisited …

May, 1972 - Silken Thread dallies in a Hong Kong shop I couldn't stay away from.

David led Barbara down Nathan Road to visit The Radio People, Ltd., a legendary audiophile store not far from the hotel. “This is where I always ended up when mom and dad turned me loose.”

He was prepared to see the place transformed by the incursion of Japanese electronics, but it was much as it had been during his last visit — the sales floor dominated by custom built enclosures of walnut, teak and mahogany, McIntosh tube amps, Uher tape decks, Stanton turntables and Tandberg receivers.

The owner, Albert Chan, shooed a couple of Brits in tweed jackets out the door. “Smoke pipe outside, then come back. I have Xavier Cugat for you to listen.” He lifted his chin at David. “Hey, you got bigger. Why you hair dark now?”

They listened to Mr. Chan’s teak-clad Spectrum loudspeakers, laughably classified as ‘bookshelf’ at 40 pounds each, and a pair of Wharfedale-equipped, Danish modern burled walnut cabinets half the size of washing machines. Barbara saw the look in his eyes. “Are these the ones you’ve been mooning over since you were fourteen?”

“Ones like these. They’ll cost a fortune to ship.”

“They’re gorgeous, and you can’t buy this merchandise anywhere else. Let’s get them.”

She was enthralled by the district’s shopping corridors, channeled through buildings from street to street — stopping to purchase a London Fog raincoat, three scarves, a jade pendant, and rhinestone decorated collars for the dogs. “They’ll look so cute in these.”

David went into a shoe store, coming out empty-handed. “I’m going to stick with my Florsheims.”

They returned to the hotel at five, meeting David’s parents at the reception desk. Lieve Aarens squealed when she saw the collars. “Isn’t this the greatest town ever? Give us half an hour, and we’ll take you to dinner.”

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