by john | Jul 3, 2014 | Uncategorized
It’s sad that my posting here has gotten so sporadic that it’s worthy of comment, but honestly, there’s only so much time in the day between writing, social media, binge-watching TrueBlood (no spoilers, fuckers, I’m only on Season 5) and building and re-building my Magic decks.
I said decks. Get your minds out of the gutter.
And while you’re getting your minds out of the gutter, get your asses to Winston-Salem, NC next weekend (July 11-13) for the first ever ConGregate SF & Fantasy con! A group of veteran con runners has gotten together with a bunch of awesome guests (and me, but there’s gotta some filler in the sausage) to put on the Piedmont Triad’s newest con!
Some of you may know that Greensboro’s StellarCon is on hiatus for a while, so hopefully this will fill the void and supplement that show when/if it comes back. I enjoyed the one StellarCon I went to, but it overlapped with Connooga, which had triple the attendance, so I had to pick that one the next year.
So here’s my ConGregate schedule –
Friday
4PM – Signing with AJ Hartley – I always love hanging out with AJ, and he’s got a new audiobook out where Thorin Oakenshield reads his (and James Hewson’s) novelization of Omlet, Prince of Danish. If you don’t get that joke, you don’t hang out with enough Shakespeare nerds in bars. And there are enough Shakespeare nerds at ConGregate to remedy that problem.
8PM – Writing “the Other” – Yes, I am a straight white man on a panel about writing outsiders in society. But I asked to be on the panel, because it is something I write and something I’m interested in, and there are women (!) and people of color (!!) on the panel.
10PM – What are “You” Reading? – this is an audience participation panel, where people bring books to talk about and tell what they’re reading and why. I’m going to bring some books to give away! I don’t know what yet, I just thought of it as I was typing this. I gotta go email some publishers! BRB.
Okay, email sent. So hopefully I’ll have some new books in addition to some gems off my bookshelves for you at ConGregate!
Saturday
10AM –Fuck. I know. That’s pretty damned early. And I’m moderating back-to-back panels. BUT, they’re pretty damned cool panels. In the first one – at 10AM – we will “Build a Big Bad Radioactive Bug” – the panel and audience will create a monster. A badass but beatable monster designed by committee. I know, it’s gonna be an elephant. Or a platypus.
11AM – Part 2 – An entirely new panel will have to come up with ways to “Kill the Big Bad Radioactive Bug” that we built in the first panel. I wish Jason Cordova was gonna be here – this is totally up his kaiju alley.
5PM – Signing with James Maxey. Or James the Lesser as he shall now be know thanks to his incredible fitness regime and weight loss over the last few years. Always fun hanging with James. Come buy my shit.
Sunday
1PM – Fairies and Vampires and Shit – I know that’s not the real title, but that’s what you’re gonna get outta me on Sunday afternoon. At least by this point my hangover will be gone. This should be a fun wrap-up, light and frothy and talking about made-up shit that goes bump in the night.
You may notice I am not doing a reading at this con. I hate reading my prose aloud, honestly, and I hate sitting through readings of other people’s prose. The lone exception is the Tiny Pirate Ninja Theatre that Misty Massey and I created during our readings at Mysticon a couple years ago. If there are toys, and a potential for mayhem, then I suppose it’s alright.
And when is “Alright” going to become a real word? It’s pissing me off. But I digress.
I once heard someone misread Peter David’s column of that name as “Booty Deegress” and have wanted to say it that was ever since, but I’m always afraid no one will understand what I’m saying or they’ll just think I don’t know how to pronounce digress and am stupid. Booty deegress.
So I’m not doing a reading, but I promise to carry books of my poetry with me and if you buy me a drink I’ll read a poem in the bar, in full performance voice. Seriously. I dare you.
Hope to see all y’all at ConGregate!
by john | Jun 28, 2014 | Uncategorized
So since last I posted here I’ve started a new job, worked there three months, got unceremoniously fired from new job, spent a month setting up a new company that will begin operations on July 1 to hopefully provide self-employed income for my family, had a great time at ConCarolinas, shared a booth with Get Some Game at HeroesCon, and written a bunch of shit. I’m still working on In the Still of the Knight, Black Knight Chronicles #5, but we’re moving ahead apace with that one and it should be out by the end of this year. I’m also working on a new Bubba for next month, and the first in a series of novellas featuring a new character for me – Quincy Harker, Demon Hunter.
Quincy Harker is the ridiculously long-lived son of Jonathan Harker and Mina Murray. You might have heard of them – they had a run-in with a vampire a while back. Well, when Dracula shared blood with Mina Murray, it affected her DNA, casing her child Quincy to be born a little more than human. He’s not a vampire, but he’s not exactly human, either. And he’s a wizard. And a bit of an asshole, honestly. He’s the guy you call when the shit has already hit the fan and been sprayed all over the room, because he’s not afraid to get his boots dirty. The first Quincy Harker novella will be available next month. Here’s a little sample – not safe for kids.
Quincy Harker, Demon Hunter Episode 1 –
I fuckin’ hate demons. That’s what ran through my head as I got out of the car and walked up the sidewalk to the Garda home. It was a nice place, for the suburbs. There was a two-car garage off to one side, a neatly manicured lawn leading up to flowerbeds in front of a nice little porch, and an SUV in the driveway because I’m sure the garage was full of bicycles, tools, lawnmowers and other shit that I only see when I get a call out here in the ‘burbs. I live in a condo in the middle of downtown Charlotte, so the only time I see lawn equipment is when I get lost in a home improvement store looking for a new mallet or maybe a new wheel for my grinder.
I walked up to the pale yellow siding nightmare of a home and stepped up on the front porch. The welcome mat was a little askew, the only imperfect thing in an otherwise totally Good Housekeeping image. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, opening my second sight and taking a look around. My third eye saw nothing out of the ordinary on the porch, no roiling black evil miasma ready to consume my soul and suck me down into the depths of Hell. It looked just as Martha Stewart in the supernatural spectrum as it did in the visible one. Good, I thought, maybe the little darlin’s just on the rag and I can get the fuck out of here and back uptown before the game lets out and traffic gets stupid.
I opened my eyes and snapped back to the mundane world. After a second to adjust back to seeing the world with my eyes instead of my soul, I rang the bell. A dog immediately went apeshit on the other side of the door, as if the real trouble wasn’t already in the house. A couple of shouted “shut up”s later, the door opened and a flushed forty-something man opened the door. The top of his balding head stopped at about my nose, but I’m tall, so I was used to that. His polo shirt had sweat stains under his man boobs, and it stretched tight across his spectacular belly. He looked up at me, close-set brown eyes set deep in a florid face, capped off with a red nose that only happens when you’ve hit the bottle pretty hard for a pretty long time.
“You Harker?” He asked, glaring up at me.
“Yep.” I said.
“You got ID?” He asked.
No. I just randomly wander up to houses in suburbia and pretend to be an exorcist, hoping to arrive at the exact time their appointment was set for. I bit my tongue before that one could escape and just handed him my card.
“You got any photo ID?” He had that belligerent tone of a middle manager, the kind of guy that shits on all his employees’ good ideas until somebody smarter than him hears them, then takes credit for the good one.
I didn’t bother to hold back this time. “You want my badge number, too? This shit doesn’t exactly come with a union card, pal. You called me, remember? I’m here, the right time, the right address, now let’s see if I’m in the right place. I’m Quincy Harker, you got something needs banishing or should I just go back to my sofa and NFL network?”
“Sorry, sorry. No need to be a —“ he cut himself off, but I didn’t.
“Dick? Yeah, I’m a dick. You’re the stupid bastard who lets a demon into his teenage daughter, yanking me off the couch in the middle of the first Panthers playoff run in living memory, but of course I’m a dick because I didn’t immediately take off my hat and wipe my shoes before entering your fucking Ikea palace here. Now point me towards your daughter’s room and get out of my way before I do something really dickish, like turn you into a toad.” I pushed past the stammering jackoff and stomped towards the stairs, registering him mumbling something about the bedroom at the end of the hall. I didn’t need his instructions, as soon as I stepped onto the second floor I could feel what I was there for. This time the sense of evil, of just wrongness was so strong I didn’t need my Sight to find it. It almost knocked me over the second I turned toward the door.
The hallway was just like a normal two-story house, scene for slaughter in so many slasher flicks. There was a small bathroom to the right of the stairs, and three bedrooms arranged around the left-hand hallway. One of these would be the master bedroom, with its own bath, and the other two would be the kids’ rooms. The one on the left had pictures of motorcycles and rock bands with more makeup than KISS, but the one at the end of the hall was unadorned. Just a simple brass nameplate announcing it as Kayleigh’s room.
I could tell from thirty feet away that Kayleigh’s room had some seriously evil shit in it. I rolled my head and cracked my knuckles, then opened up my Second Sight to get a good look at the evil in the magical spectrum.
I slammed my Sight shut almost as quickly as it came into focus, shaking my head to clear the images from my mind. But there is no Visine for the mind’s eye, and I was stuck with that shit forever. Whatever was on the other side of that door wasn’t human, was powerful as shit, and was really hungry. It was also in a really good mood, which disturbed the fuck out of me. There’s nothing worse than a happy demon, at least as far as the humans around it are concerned.
“Mr. Garda?” I yelled down the stairs.
“Yes?” His voice came back. I might have heard ice cubes jingle in a glass. Good, if this was as bad as I thought it was, he was going to need to get seriously drunk.
“Who else is home?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, who else is in the building? Is your wife here? Your son?” I left off the “jackass,” but it was pretty well implied.
“No, they’re gone. My wife is out of town on business for two weeks, and my son has been staying at a friend’s house since Kayliegh got sick. It’s just you, me and Kayleigh.” And whatever has got its claws wrapped around Kayleigh’s soul.
“That’s good. You might want to leave yourself for a little while.” Please don’t ask a lot of fucking questions.
“Why?”
Shit. “Because what I’m dealing with up here is pretty dangerous, and I don’t want you to get hurt.” And I don’t want this fucker to have another vessel to jump to if your daughter suddenly becomes uninhabitable.
“I don’t think I can -“
“Would you please just get the fuck out so I can quit worrying about your fat ass and save your daughter?” I yelled. Maybe a little direct, but I really didn’t want to have to fight this thing more than once. I heard a clatter of footsteps and then the front door slammed shut. Nice. I didn’t believe he’d actually leave. Maybe that panicked edge in my voice was useful after all.
I turned back to the door. “Just you and me, now, buddy. So why don’t you come out of the girl and let’s handle this like men?”
The voice that answered rang through my head like a dentist’s drill, piercing and ululating. “I can’t come out. Not yet. But when I do you’ll see that I’m nothing like a man.” Then it laughed, and in that laugh were the screams of millennia of tormented souls, all shrieking together to make one terrible sound.
“Then I guess I have to come in.” I said, and strode to the door. I lifted a size 11 Doc Marten and kicked the door just beside the lock. The jamb splintered, the door flew in, and my worst nightmares were realized.
by john | Dec 30, 2013 | Uncategorized
It’s been a little quiet lately on the release front, since Paint it Black dropped in October, so I thought I’d give you a little idea of what’s going on at the keyboard around here. Just to remind folks that I do a little more than play Magic and go to my day job.
1) The dragon book is percolating. I’ll dust it off in a couple months and see what I think of it. I already know it’s choppy and the ending is rushed, so there’s probably a good 10,000 words to be added in to make the resolution make sense and not make people feel like I just threw them off a cliff. I’ll pick that up after I finish this next little gem.
2) I’m working on Black Knight 5 – In the Still of the Knight. This is the first of a major two-part arc that the whole series has been building up to. I’m doing lots of nasty things to the boys and everyone around them, so I fully expect some hate mail. But I think it’s going to be a helluva story, so that should outweigh the pain in the end. I really need to write 5 & 6 together, because there is a little bit of a cliffhanger between them. Not sure how that’s going to work out, because I’ve never written that way before. That’s why I have a brilliant editor – to get me through the crap I don’t know how to do. I hope to be finished with book 5 by the end of winter and book 6 sometime later in the year. Book 6 will not release in 2014, no matter when I finish it.
3) I’m also working on a traditional fantasy thing based off an old D&D character I used to play. He was the world’s most impulsive thief, and his favorite phrase was “What’s the worst that could happen?” Then he found out. It feels like a trilogy, but I gotta write the first one first. So far I like the characters, just gotta figure out the plot and build the world. I’m starting to understand why traditional fantasy novels are so friggin’ long – you gotta explain a lot more shit than when you’re writing in the same world your readers live in. World-building is hard, y’all.
4) I haven’t forgotten Bubba, but it’ll probably be March before a new Bubba story hits the street, thanks to my other commitments. But in the meantime, there’ll be another Steampunk story featuring Bubba’s great-grandpappy Beauregard out in a couple weeks. It’s in the anthology Capes & Clockwork, coming soon from Dark Oak.
5) And speaking of Dark Oak, the submission period for Big Bad 2 – an Eviller Anthology (not the real title) is almost over, and I’ve started picking through some of the subs. There are very few open slots this time, so the competition is going to be fierce. But we’ve also received submissions from some invited writers that are just absolutely goddam amazing, so I think this anthology will be killer. Assuming I ever get around to writing my story for it, that is!
6) And then there are incorporation documents and paperwork for getting the Second Star Foundation started. Every time I turn around it feels like another friend of mine is diagnosed with another life-threatening illness that keeps them unable to work and earn, so creating the safety net of a charity designed for writers that are struck down by disease is a huge priority for me. I’ll give you more details as they arise, but you can read all about the beginnings of it over at Magical Words.
And I play Magic a couple times a week and I have a full-time job. Not to mention the fact that I still pick up theatre gigs for extra cash. So that’s what’s going on in my world. What of those projects, if any, excites you the most?
by john | Nov 14, 2013 | Uncategorized
There’s a lot going on right now about poverty, and welfare, and Obamacare, and insurance, and all sorts of other “are”s, and some of the current discourse makes me want to puke.
For example, there’s a post out there about how people on welfare shouldn’t have a cell phone or an iPad, and that’s an incontrovertible fact. Well, lemme lay this out there for you – there are no incontrovertible facts about poverty, and until you’ve lived in somebody’s house, you should probably keep your damn mouth shut about them. If you live in your car, you might be better off paying a cell phone bill than a rent bill to actually get a job. And if you’ve recently gone from not-broke to broke as hell, you might still have a few nice things left over that were worth more to you either functionally or sentimentally than they were to pawn or sell on Craigslist.
Look, I get it. We’re all raised to believe that you work hard and good things happen, but it doesn’t always work out that way. Sometimes you make one bad decision and it screws you financially for years, or maybe even generations. Sometimes you’re just unlucky, or you didn’t do well in school, or something outside your control screwed you, and you need a hand getting back on your feet. I’ve certainly had my fair share of times over the years when I’ve had it rough and had to beg and borrow to make ends meet, and without help of friends and family I wouldn’t have made it through.
So if you’ve got enough to get by, good on you. If you can reach down and help someone out, please do so. You never know who you’re helping get out of a tight spot. And someday it might be you.
And if you want to be judgmental and not share any drop of the milk of human kindness, then go fuck yourself.
by john | Nov 7, 2013 | Uncategorized
We’ve gotten some great submissions for The Big Bad 2, but I want more! To that end, we have extended the submission deadline until January 1, 2014. So if you didn’t have time to put something together before now, well, now you do! After all, you didn’t want to do NaNoWriMo or spend holiday time with your family, did you?
Hell no! Get to work, penmonkey!
by john | Sep 5, 2013 | Uncategorized
Today I’m over at Magical Words talking a little more about DragonCon and a little more about the concept of “true fans.” And no, this has nothing to do with cosplay and whether girls who like to dress up are real geek girls or not. I’m not in a position to judge anyone’s geek street cred, and anyone who wants to dress up as anything they like can feel free.
Except maybe furries. Furries kinda creep me out. But that’s just me.
Anyway, go to Magical Words. No furries.
