by john | Nov 22, 2011 | Fiction
The fantasy world lost a giant today. Anne McCaffrey has flown from us. This is a small tribute that I made for her. I hope it honors her memory in some small way.
Friends
By John G. Hartness
“And what about you, Anne? What are you going to be when you grow up?” Mrs. Pennywise asked, her saccharine tone hiding the disdain she usually showed for Annie. No matter what the girl tried to do, nothing seemed to make the old woman like her. Her dresses were never starched enough. Her shoes were never polished enough. And her hair, no matter how long she spent brushing, was never done right for the old bat.Annie was through trying to make her happy, though. It didn’t matter what lies she told, she was never going to get a gold star in her class. So why not tell the truth.
“I’m going to be a DrakeKnight, just like my Grandda was!” She pointed out the window at the cloudless sky, defiance written all over her round eleven-year-old face.
Mrs. Pennywise said nothing, just hrmph’d in that condescending way adults had when they thought kids were being stupid, and went on to Darcy Nevins, who sat right behind Annie in class. Darcy wanted to be a ballerina, and Mrs. Pennywise praised her and cooed over how pretty Darcy was and how she could be anything she wanted to be. Of course Darcy could be anything she wanted to be, her father owned the mercantile and half the village. Darcy already was everything the rest of the children wanted to be. She was rich, smart, pretty, and the teacher’s pet. If she wasn’t so darn nice it would have been easy for Annie to hate her.
But Darcy was Annie’s best friend, had been ever since they were little kids in the first form. And now that they were in sixth form and starting their journey into womanhood, the two were even more inseparable. They shared lunches, swapping back and forth the nasty bits of celery and carrots their mothers sent. They walked home together every day, at least as far as Darcy’s house, where the two girls would play until Annie’s father came by to collect her as he walked home from a long day in the woods.
But today Darcy was even more perfect than usual, and Annie was in even more trouble with Mrs. Pennywise than usual. So it was no wonder that when the headmistress rang the bell for recess, Annie bolted from the room before Darcy could even get out of her desk. Annie ran pell-mell across the playground to her favorite sulking spot, a giant elm tree with huge spreading roots that reached out ike sprawled fingers across the ground. Annie nestled among the roots, wishing with all her heart that she could just climb inside the tree and disappear. But she couldn’t, so she sat with her back pressed up against the trunk of the tree and pulled her knees up tight to her chest, making a nice dark cave to hide her head from the brightly lit playground.
She sat there, pretending to be part of the tree for the better part of five minutes until something thunked against the back of her neck. It didn’t hurt, exactly, just surprised her enough to make her jerk her head ever so slightly upward. She caught herself, but too late. She’d been seen. More thunks and plunks rained down on her head and shoulders, and she realized quickly what was happening. She’d been found. Steven and his irritating brothers had found her and now her recess would be even more ruined. Well, they’d picked the wrong day, Annie decided. Today was the day she stopped putting up with any garbage from anybody, even Steven Dawson.
Another acorn plopped off the top of Annie’s head, and she sprang to her feet. She knew one of them was close, she could smell his toothpaste. So she jumped to her feet and dove to her left, planting a shoulder right in the stomach of Steven’s older brother Jamie.
“Oof!” Jamie exhaled hard as she caught him by surprise, tumbling to the ground on top of the winded boy. Annie quickly sprang to her feet, stepping on Jamie’s belly for good measure as she did so. Steven stood by the trunk of the tree, her tree, gawping at her like she was an animal in the zoo or something. She ran at him, swinging her fists wildly, but she’d forgotten the third Dawson brother. Avery Dawson stepped from behind the tree right behind Annie and wrapped his arms around her, pinning her arms to her sides in a bear hug. She struggled as hard as she could, but the bigger boy didn’t let go.
“Fight all you want, little DrakeKnight!” Steven chanted. “Dragons are about as real as your mother! Neither one will save you now!” Mention of her mother, dead seven years ago in childbirth, brought hot tears to Annie’s eyes and made her struggle all the harder. By now Jamie had gotten to his feet and was tossing more acorns and twigs at her as he and his snotty little brother called her “midget DrakeKnight” and “Dragonlover” and other names designed to embarrass her about her dreams.
Annie stopped struggling and just stood there, panting with fury as tears streamed down her face. Steven stepped right up to her and whispered nastily “It’s no wonder your mother would rather be dead than have to raise a stupid kid like you, Annie Fanny! I don’t blame your dad for spending every day drunk in the woods so he doesn’t have to look at your stupid face.” Annie just cried all the harder, because he was telling at least some truth. Her dad had been smelling like whiskey when he came home lately, and none of the other woodsmen were still working this late in the fall.
Steven waved to his brothers and they let her go, running back to the swings to terrorize other students for their lunch money. They knew Annie didn’t have any money to steal. Annie curled up on the ground this time, wrapping herself around the tree roots and sobbing into the playground dust. She didn’t know how long she’d been there crying before she fell asleep, but when she woke up she had the bark imprinted all along one arm and the side of her face, so she must have been there for a while. It was colder, and the sun was starting to set, so the school day must have been almost over. They forgot me, she thought. They just left me out here all alone.
Good. I don’t need them. I don’t need any of them. Except Darcy. She’s still okay. But the rest of them can just go to the hot place! No sooner had the thought crossed her mind than Annie tried to erase it with a prayer. I’m sorry, Lord. I didn’t mean it. Thy will be done, Amen. Feeling a little better about wishing damnation on her classmates, Annie stood and began walking towards the school. She was only halfway across the playground when the doors opened, spilling happy children into freedom for the end of the school day. Annie had slept all through the afternoon classes under the tree. She edged cautiously over to the side of the school, planning to join the students as they came out. Hopefully no one would be the wiser.
All her hopes were dashed when a huge winged shadow flew low over the schoolyard, scattering children and adults alike. Seconds later, a huge red and green dragon glided to a landing right on top of the school. As dragons go, it was a rather small dragon, less than fifteen feet long from nose to tail. But to a group of six to ten-year-olds, it seemed very large indeed. The dragon roared, and snapped out its neck at a fleeing student. The child dove onto its belly to avoid the snapping jaws, and the dragon drew back its head, seeming pleased with itself.
The dragon hopped down off the building, blocking the door with its hindquarters and facing outward into the yard where all the students were gathered. Some had run for the gate, but the dragon belched a stream of fire at them, herding them back into the yard. Others ran for the far end of the playground, but the dragon simply hopped over them and they shuffled into a clump in the middle of the clearing between the swings and the teeter-totters.
The dragon seemed to take joy in their attempts to escape, flicking out a wing to knock this child over when he tried to run, lashing out with his tail to trip another child as she ran to help her friend. Annie watched all this in confusion for several minutes until Darcy saw her and started to run in her direction. The dragon flicked out a claw, and Darcy stopped in her tracks, the claw hovering just inches in front of her face. Suddenly it dawned on Annie what it was doing – it was teasing them.
“HEY!” She bellowed in her fiercest voice, stomping out into the playground to stand next to Darcy. “Leave her alone!”
“And why should I, little meatling?” The dragon asked, bringing its huge head down to look Annie in the eye. The dragon’s eye was the size of Annie’s whole head, but she wasn’t afraid. She had realized that this dragon was just like Mrs. Pennywise, just like Steven Dawson and his stupid brothers. It was picking on them just because it was bigger. And that wasn’t going to work anymore.
“Because I said so.”
“And who, little meatling, are you?”
“I am Annalisa Chisoman Pern, granddaughter of the legendary DrakeKnight Religan Pern, and by the authority of my bloodline I claim you as my dragon! Now you must do as I say! And I say leave her alone.”
“You claim me, little girl? I don’t think so. I’ve never heard of your grandfather, and I don’t think you’re commanding me to do anything.”
“I don’t care if you’ve heard of him or not, it’s the DrakeKnight law, and you have to do what I say. And I say you leave Darcy alone.” Annie stood firm in front of the dragon, arms folded across her chest. The other children had drawn back when she started speaking, and now they looked from her to the dragon warily, unsure of what was happening.
“Well, if it’s the law,” the dragon drawled. He reared his head back and drew in a deep breath, but halted just before he exhaled at Annie’s upraised hand.
“I didn’t say you could breathe fire.”
“I didn’t ask you.”
“You can’t breathe fire unless I say so. It’s the DrakeKnight law.”
“You’re not a DrakeKnight.”
“Yet, but I will be.”
“Not if I cook you first!” The dragon inhaled again and opened his mouth wide, but nothing came out.
“I told you.”
“How did you do that?”
“It’s DrakeKnight law. My Grandda told me all about the rules. And you have stinky breath.”
“Well, you’re a rude little girl!”
“Then the two of you should get along just fine.” A new voice, deeper and rumbling, came from atop the school. Annie looked up to see a truly huge red dragon hovering over the schoolhouse. She couldn’t land, because the roof would cave in under her weight. The smaller dragon looked around as if trying to find an exit when the bigger dragon spoke again.
“Annalisa Chisoman Pern, I hereby grant you status of Honorary DrakeKnight-in-training, to be bonded with my youngest son Milambrisamon at the earliest opportunity.”
Annie looked up at the huge red dragon and dipped into her best curtsey. “My thanks, lady drake. May I know what you are called?”
“I am Silambristar, called Star by my rider.”
“But my grandda’s dragon was called Star!” Annie exclaimed.
“Indeed. And now his granddaughter shall ride on Star’s child. You may call him Brim.” The huge red dragon flapped her wings once, twice and shot off into the air, quickly fading to a crimson speck on the horizon.
Annie looked around at the children and adults crowded in the schoolyard and stepped closer to Brim. “Don’t worry,” She whispered. “I won’t let them hurt you.”
The dragon leaned in close to her ear, so close that his breath almost burned her neck and he whispered back “Me too.”
by john | Nov 16, 2011 | Business of publishing, Fiction, Writing
My new Kindle Fire came in the UPS yesterday. I am teh happy. Honestly, I haven’t had a ton of time to play with it between work, finishing up a short story and sending it off, and then back to work. But it’s really pretty. And I have the next four days off work (two to make up for working Saturday and Sunday last weekend), so I should be able to get some time on the device this weekend.
Between playing Dragon Age II and writing stories, that is. The new Bubba story is out, and I think it’s pretty fun. It ended up being a lot longer than I expected, but there were a lot of monsters to kill, and a lot of ways to devise to kill them, so that took up a few extra thousand words.
Here’s the Amazon link – go buy it, it’s only $1.49.
Here’s the Barnes & Noble link – see above.
There will be a print Bubba anthology coming sometime in the spring. My plan is to get five short stories completed, then offer an anthology that will be available as print and ebook. Genesis print copies are coming, I promise, once I get time to format the book for printing. So probably December.
I’ve also started submitting short stories, because I want my SFWA card, and the quickest way to get one is to get three acceptances by approved publications. So I’ll be hammering on a bunch of short stories and submitting them to magazines for publication. Then once the rights revert, I’ll self-pub the stories as ebooks or in anthologies. I sent my first one off last night, and have several other ideas percolating. So hopefully I can get that rolling this weekend.
by john | Nov 14, 2011 | Appearances, Fiction, Real Life
Yep, he’s back and bigger and badder than ever. This time Bubba faces his most deadly challenge yet – the ballet!
I intentionally went with kind of a cheezy font for this, because it’s kind of a cheesy little fun story. Bubba goes to the ballet to investigate strange occurrences, as usual things are not what they seem, and as usual there ends up with significant bloodshed and property damage. It’ll be out in ebook form sometime later this week.
I’ve also created a new print book that will primarily only be available at signings. It’s a sampler of sorts, with a Black Knight short story (Movie Knight), a Bubba story (Voodoo Children), a few of my literary fiction stories, and a few poems. It is actually available for order in print online (here’s the link), but I won’t be making this an ebook. The stories are all already available in other things, so I don’t see a lot of point in creating the ebook for this one. I just wanted a cheap sampler for people to pick up at art shows and things like that. Speaking of which, I’ll be at the NoDa All Arts Market this Friday night, so if you’re around, come on out to the Neighborhood Theatre and come see me!
Had a great weekend of music and theatre, starting Thursday night with Don Dixon and Marti Jones performing at The Evening Muse. Those guys are just awesome together. Then spent the weekend at the SC Theatre Association meeting, catching up with old friends and making new ones. Then last night I went back to the Muse and saw Bleu Edmondson and Roger Creager. They put on an awesome show in front of only about 60 people (sorry, it’s a bank town, what can I say? Nobody goes out on a school night). I’m a big Bleu Edmondson fan, and Creager killed it. It was a lot of fun, and a lot more dancing and jumping up and down than I’m used to at the Muse. Most of the stuff I go see there is pretty sedate, but most of the stuff I go see anywhere is pretty sedate.
So that’s what’s up. Genesis is gathering some good reviews, and starting to build some excitement, and I’ve already come up with my next bright shiny idea for a trilogy, so I need to get some writing done, fulfill some obligations, and get on with all these novels I have rolling around in my head!
by john | Oct 26, 2011 | Fiction, Return to Eden, Writing
Aside from being a killer book cover, it might help to know a little about the book, huh?
Genesis is the first volume of the Return to Eden trilogy. Unlike The Black Knight Chronicles, which is an open-ended series of stand-alone stories featuring the same characters in a string of related, but largely unconnected adventures, Return to Eden will be a traditional trilogy. It’s a three-book story, then we’re done.
The story centers on 17-year-old Christin Kinsey, her brother Matt, and the group of survivors they assemble in their journey. In the aftermath of an EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) attack, everything with a computer chip is fried, effectively throwing the world back a century in our technology. Most cars don’t work, most household appliances don’t work, and even if they did, there’s no electricity to power them. There’s no TV, no internet, no game consoles, no cell phones and no iPods.
Sounds like Hell for Teenagers, doesn’t it?
Well it gets worse. Not only do the teens have to learn how to survive in a world suddenly devoid of most of the creature comforts we’ve grown up with, but the basics of civilization start to erode with the infrastructure. Small-town sheriffs become more like feudal lords than law enforcement officers.
And then there’s the odd little fact that everyone between 13 and 20 seems to have suddenly developed superpowers. With the interference from technology gone, people are able to touch magic again, old, elemental magic. But only if you’re young enough, or open enough, to believe. So now the adults are acting like the kids in Lord of the Flies while a bunch of super-powered teenagers try to stay alive.
And all Christin really wants to do is make sure her mom is safe.
That’s a brief rundown on Genesis and the whole Return to Eden series. Available 11.11.11 wherever books are sold.
by john | Oct 25, 2011 | Business of publishing, Fiction, Return to Eden, Writing
Baen Books is one of the pioneers in ebook sales, particularly in genre fiction. While I think they do a lot of things right, there are a couple of things I think they miss the boat on (notably, not having their ebooks available for purchase from Amazon, you know, the largest seller of books in any format in the world??). But since I don’t run the company or have any financial stake in anything they do, it’s not really any of my business.
But one thing Baen does that I’ve never seen anywhere else is offer e-ARCs for purchase. What’s an e-ARC, you might ask? Well, let’s start with what an ARC is. An ARC is an Advance Reader Copy, a pre-release copy of a book typically provided to journalists, reviewers, or people of note to garner blurbs, reviews or hype about a book before it is released to the general public. An e-ARC is an electronic version of the same thing.
What Baen has done is turn this into a marketing tool, and a revenue stream as well. They sell e-ARCs on their website, making it very clear that these are not the final versions of the books. Things might change a little, there might be some further polishing, some cover edits, things like that, before the final book is released. But a hardcore fan doesn’t want to wait. Not only that, but these hardcore fans will actually pay a premium to get the book early.
I’m hoping that I have a few hardcore fans, because as of today I will be offering e-ARCs of Genesis for sale here on the website. These will not be sold at a premium, but will be the same price as the release price of the book – $2.99. These are ARCs, though, so don’t kill me on typos. If you find one, please send me an email and point it out, so I can change it before the final release. The cover is also not finalized, but will be close. So this is the whole story, the completed story, just not at its final polished state.
But if you’re one of those people who has to be the first one on your block to have the next cool thing, then this is your deal. This is the kickoff volume to my new series, a very different series than the other stuff of mine you’ve read. This is much less silly, and it’s designed to be teen-friendly, so no f-bombs.
And that was tough, let me tell you!
But here’s the link to buy with PayPal. Just shoot me $2.99, and within 24 hours I’ll email you the file in whatever format you choose (PDF, ePub or Kindle).Enjoy!
by john | Jun 27, 2011 | Fiction, Return to Eden, Vampires, Writing
So Knight Moves will likely not be available for purchase in July of this year.
It’s not ready. That’s just the deal. I’ve completed a couple of drafts on the book, sent it off to some beta readers, and am awaiting feedback. I’ll then incorporate that feedback into another revision and send it off to my new editor, Lynn. Then (if the sample pages she did for me this weekend that led me to say “you’re hired” in about eight seconds are any indication) she will rip the thing to absolute shreds and I’ll spend a few weeks putting it back together. By this time July will be gone, and there won’t be a book yet. But when the book comes out it will be a few things. First, it will be the most expensive book I’ve published so far. Second, it will be the most polished, and hopefully typo-free. And I think it’s going to be pretty good.
I’m happy with the overall flow of the story. There’s a little more character development in this one than in the last two, and a few new characters added to the world. Some I kill, some leave town and some stick around, at least for a little while. There’s more Father Mike, because people missed him in Back in Black (so did I), and more Sabrina. There’s also a lot more bloodshed, and I think that I’ve successfully raised the stakes for the characters. They have more on the line than in the other books, and I think that makes for a stronger book.It’s about the same length as the others, maybe a hair shorter.
So it needs more polish, and that’s going to mean it won’t be out until the end of July at the latest, and August is more likely. Sorry if there was anyone really desperate for more of the Black Knight boys, but you can go to Amazon and pick up Movie Knight, the short story I published last weekend. That should hold you over. I’ll probably make another short story or two happen between now and the release of Knight Moves, so keep an eye out.
In the meantime, while I’m polishing Knight Moves, I’ve made some pretty good progress on Return to Eden. I’m pretty sure that will end up being the title for the series, so I’m not sure what this book will be called yet. For now, we’ll keep it as is and call it R2E. I hammered out a couple thousand words this weekend, then got stuck. I mean bad stuck, like a Hummer in a mudhole kinda stuck. So Suzy and I sat around for the better part of an hour brainstorming, and between the two of us we got the thing back on track. She helped a ton with the overall plot arc of the book, and that let me get back to outlining and writing. I’m about 25,000 words into the thing, and now I actually know where I’m going with it.
It’s going to need some serious love and attention when I finish the first draft, because I know the first 15K or so needs a total rewrite. The language just doesn’t work, it’s way too formal for the book, but I’m consciously not going back to work on that until I get to the end of the first draft. I can’t let myself go back and edit until I’m done with the first run – otherwise I’ll never write the damned book! But now that I know where I’m going it should come together pretty quickly, and I might have it ready to go as early as September. It’s a big departure from The Black Knight Chronicles, but I think most folks will like it. I’m really starting to dig these characters, for totally different reasons than the BK boys.
Then since I didn’t have anything better to do, and because I can’t resist a bright shiny, I started a completely different book. And by completely different, I mean a cop thriller. No magic, no supernatural creatures, just a serial killer and a cop that’s chasing him. I’ve got the first couple of chapters done, and I’ve got the outline done for that as well. That one’s been an interesting journey as well, because the character that I started Chapter 1 with, who I thought was going to be the main character for the whole book, turned out to be the sidekick. Because it can’t be his book, it has to be the cop’s book. I think it’s an interesting concept, and once it’s a little further along I’ll give you a couple of hints about it to see what you guys think. It should be finished up early fall as well, maybe October or so.
So in summary –
Knight Moves will not be available in July, but should be out in August.
Return to Eden (tentative title) will be out early fall, maybe as early as September.
Untitled Thriller will be out later in the fall, maybe as early as October.
I’ve got a bunch of Black Knight short stories in mind, and want to get at least one per month out for the rest of the year.
Black Knight Book 4 will be coming late this year or early 2012, depending on how quickly I finish up the other stuff. I already know a little about that book, as in what will be the Big Bad and what a couple of subplots are going to be. I also know the Big Bad for Books 5 & 6 in that series, so that’s a good outlook for next year.
