Balticon 47 After Action Report

b47_banner_1I was simply not prepared for Balticon this year. Well, to be fair to myself, I did get to Balticon with everything I needed to have, and I did everything I said I was going to do. I was exhausted throughout the weekend, though, and getting everything together was not easy. I really need to take another look at my time-management practices and learn when to tell people, “I just can’t fix your computer / write your program / talk you down off that ledge right now, because I had plans to do something else. So read a book / do it in a spreadsheet for now / call 911 and ask for help, because I’m gonna be busy.”

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On June 5th, buy Mutiny Springs Eternal and get a free eBook!

MutinyCome Aboard for the First Adventures of the Arbiters!

The Arbiter Logs novelize the adventures heard on the award-winning Arbiter Chronicles audio series.  These stories are prequels to the novels Taken Liberty and Unfriendly Persuasion, already available wherever books are sold.

How to get a free eBook:

On June 5th, buy a copy of Episode One, Mutiny Springs Eternal, for just 99 cents from Amazon.com. (I’m happy any day you buy my books, but I’d like to see a June 5th spike on the Amazon charts. If we raise that number high enough, the series will get even more recognition in the retail market.)

Forward your receipt for the purchase to editor@firebringerpress.com, and I’ll send you your free copy of the next novella, A Man Walks Into a Bar, absolutely free! (It should be ready for release by June 30th.)

I respect your privacy! When you contact me, your email address will never be shared, sold or used for mass email purposes.

From the jacket copy for The Arbiter Logs: Mutiny Springs Eternal:

A century ago, the Faraday disappeared. The great ship dropped into the mysterious region known as L-space, never to be seen again. There are only legends left, legends of mutiny, of murder, and of the discovery of forbidden secrets. Today, the young midshipmen of the patrol ship Arbiter have found Faraday, a ghost ship orbiting a remote planet. And, somehow, someone… or something… has survived.

Mutiny Springs Eternal is the first adventure of the crew of the CNV Arbiter, adapted from the Mark Time and Parsec Award-winning audio drama series, The Arbiter Chronicles. Library Journal calls the Arbiters “a cast of compelling characters,” and Analog calls the Chronicles “a fun romp… like a cross between the funniest episodes of the original Star Trek and Monty Python.”

Review – Great Classic Science Fiction (From BBC Audio)

032248373I found this collection on my local library shelves. I’m an audio junkie. (Surprising confession from the director of a radio drama group, I know.) If you follow me on Goodreads, you know I usually have three books going at once: a non-fiction book or novel, a graphic novel or comic collection, and an audio book. This collection featured reading by some notable voice talent, including Scott Brick, who’s a favorite of mine. It seemed like a natural for me. I don’t read enough short stories, and the SF genre thrives on short stories. They’re also better for listening than long, complicated novels. I listen while driving and working, so I can become distracted and lose the thread pretty easily. (I hope none of my narrating colleagues who see this are offended. I lose the thread when I’m talking, too. It’s not personal!) Continue reading

Milestone

Unfriendly Persuasion Front MedUnfriendly Persuasion is finished!

Well, of course, my third novel, the second novel in my Arbiter Chronicles series, was finished a long time ago, back in the Fall of 2011. But I’ve been sloooowwwly releasing an audio version of it. Every other week I’ve put a chapter up on my podcast feed.

Very shortly after I began podcasting, late in 2005, I did the same with my first novel, Taken Liberty. Releasing a free audio of the book I’d put so much time and energy into getting published seemed a little risky, but I think it paid off. Over 10,000 people have listened to Taken Liberty, it got me a lot of attention in the podcast community, and it really helped me establish myself as a New Media Author.

I’ve released all my fiction as free audio, as well as all the episodes of my Arbiters radio show. There are over a hundred episodes in my feed, and I’ve broken a million downloads. Recording, editing and releasing this one was nothing new for me.

But I did spend a year doing it, following a year writing and publishing it. I feel like this particular work has been with me for a long time. And bringing it to a close reminds me how much has changed in the eight incredibly short years that have passed since I released my first podcast. Friends have drifted away, loved ones have died. The kid who provided the soprano voices of children in my early episodes is now six foot two and writing his own scripts. The other little guy who ran around my studio, wanting nothing more than to shout “hello!” into every mic because he couldn’t yet read a script, is now getting ready for High School and teaching martial arts.

A lot has changed. Don’t know what’s next, but I’m always up to something. If you were waiting until it was finished to listen to Unfriendly Persuasion, well, that excuse is gone. It’s all up there now and waiting for you. The chapters are in the feed here. If you’ve already listened to it, please let me know what you thought!

I believe now I shall sleep for a few minutes.

Words Overheard in a Restaurant

The words came at me suddenly, from over my shoulder…

“I hate Muslims!”

“Well, of course. And they’re all going to hell, because their religion is satanic. They worship a false god.”

“What about the Jews? And let’s not forget Mormons…”

So I was at dinner with my family, an evening out that was to be followed by a movie, and I heard this conversation going on behind me. I’d known that this was a group of Christian gentlemen, because they’d begun their dinner with prayer. I hadn’t heard most of their conversation at that point, except for the word “libertarian,” which always jumps out at me. Most people don’t use it. Those that do usually have very strong opinions about libertarians, one way or the other. Of those who both use it and have strong opinions, only a fraction probably know what it means. Continue reading