Twin brothers walk through a fallen log and land in a kingdom under siege. The wizard who pulled them across dies doing it, and Chris — the one with blood on his cheek — is handed the dead man's job. His first lesson is a knife across the palm and a chandelier he has never been taught to light.
For parents and teachers: roughly 48,000 words across 31 short chapters, first person, alternating between the two brothers. Book 2 of the Accidental Adventures series, and it opens with enough context to be read on its own. No romance, no crude language. Worth knowing going in: the magic system runs on the caster's own blood, and Chris carries wounds through most of the book.
Accidental Wizard will blow your socks off. Get it now.
I've completed the first draft and initial editing of Accidental Chessmen, the third book in the Accidental Adventures Series. I have sent the manuscript off to the publisher for consideration.
What do you get when you join a 1977 Dodge PowerWagon and a Browning .50 caliber with a mysterious manuscript written in code and a thumb drive of destiny? Bugs in the System will be coming soon - maybe the end of the month, if I get right on it. I'll do some editing and self-publish this novel of a future controlled by AI, where the population is carefully limited and managed with the help of giant insects. Here's a picture I decided not to use. The other pictures I've generated are more action-packed and scary. I'll have save those until closer to publication.
Of course, my problem is a bad case of the doldrums. I was experimenting with template changes on my blogspot blog and lost all the links etc. And Google just came out with some standards with talk about the community policing effort. I fear that's just a way of saying anything I write there, or have already written there will be found offensive by self-appointed sensitivity readers. I've enjoyed writing there, doing interviews, reviews of books and movies, boasting about my own books, piling on fun facts from history, and chronicling my travels for about ten years. Suddenly, I question whether there's a point. Maybe this newsletter and my substack are enough to contain all that. On the other hand, it has outlasted most blogs, continuing into the present when blogs are seriously passe. Feel free to offer advice on the subject. As far as a vehicle for generating interest and sales in my books, I can't say that it has been a success. Of course, I could say the same about the newsletter, and every other social media I use. On the other hand, it's nice to go back and read something like this.
In reading, I finished Robert Parker's Appaloosa. It's a quick read with a disappointing ending. I am, however, very tempted to get the next book in the series. I'm also about half way through Stephen Lawhead's Byzantium, and am enjoying it.
I would really like to be the editor for an anthology in the Saber and Sorcery genre. Think Flintlock Fantasy ranging from D'Artagnan and the musketeers to Revolutionary War era through the Napoleonic era. Bold swordplay and deadly magic among quick-witted men clad in civilization's veneer. In fact, I'm working on what I expected to be a short story for just such an anthology, but after considering all the things I wanted to cover, it will have to be a novella.
Music this week has taken me from Ennio Moricone to ELO to something I can't remember at the moment. I did, however, hear something from a singer I don't know and whose name I don't remember that sounded to me like a cross between country and rap. I'm selective in what I like about the former and deeply detest the latter. Needless to say, it didn't resonate with me. I did find delight in some classical music on the telly, but I've forgotten the title, even though I told myself I was going to explore search out that piece and get a copy for myself.
Speaking of travels--that was a couple paragraphs ago--I did do some recently. We managed to go to southern Utah between flooding episodes. We traveled as far south as Bluff and spent part of a day in Moab seeking Eldorado, driving over the Mountains of the Moon and through the Valley of the Shadow in our quest to ride, boldly ride, in search of Eldorado--actually a place my dad used to live on the mesa. Bad dirt trails and a vehicle with a clearance too low to dare such an excursion prevented us from penetrating to the fabled land. We did get to listen to several hours of Louis L'Amour books though.
Anyone interested in a giveaway for either Accidental Pirates or Accidental Wizard?
If Monsters, Epic Tales, and Whispers in the Dark bring you a ghoulish grin - enter here.
If old fashioned and cutting edge Science Fiction and Fantasy float your boat - here's your destination.
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