At long last, I am very pleased to announce the release of my fourth book – and third novel – of Machine Civilization: “Cursed Hearts.” The paperback is available via Amazon and Goodreads.
To make it easier for y’all to celebrate along with me, all three novels, in their ebook form, are available at Smashwords for only US$0.99 each! (note: you might need to toggle Adult Content: On in the upper right to see CH)
Thanks for everyone’s support and encouragement!
Europa’s appearance was originally in Part 4, but the break didn’t fit. This installment is a little shorter, but my action sequences always are. You’ll see more of that next week once ‘Cursed Hearts’ is commercially available.
Editing of Proof Copy this weekend. Shall I come back to Logres & Europa? Move onto something else? I get many ‘Likes,’ but comments & quesions are very welcome, too!
I’ve seen about 200 words or so beyond this, but it’s getting late and I didn’t want to make any unforced errors. I think constantly introducing new characters is my besotting sin.
“It is not good that man be alone.” Thanks be to God, Europa’s back, even if just for this installment. Everybody gets older. Not one, single clue what happens next. Awesome!
RealLife(TM) work followed me home, not much, but I was off the clock, which sucked. I’m trying to make this a 4-5,000 word story complete by the time my CH proof copy gets here (irrational deadlines!) so that’s 1k words each night. That’s about what’s below the fold. Makes sense: my stories are characters and their interactions; this whole entry is Logres on his own, so, honestly, it’s a little boring. I had to get him halfway across Europe; now that that’s done, I hope he and Europa can show me what comes tomorrow!
All right: I’ve an idea for a short story. I’m breaking it into parts, three, probably, that I can write over the next few days. Reilly’s out, but I still wanted something nostalgic, but, as I said in the last post, inside my future history. So, let’s rock.
Editing and cover for ‘Cursed Hearts’ complete and the hardcopy proof will be in my hands Thursday or Friday. I’m sure there’s a half dozen more surprises lurking in there for me. So for now, I can sit back and relax…!
[Wanders around the house. Vacuums upstairs. Looks at interwebs. Glances at watch: noon]
Bored!
I’d a notion last night this would happen, but was far too drunk to worry about it. In the few quiet moments at Mass this morning, I did. If I don’t start writing something, I’ll go crazy. So, I paged through some notes and pondered.
At first, I thought about striking out in a completely different direction: going back to the script I wrote for the Steampunk Reilly graphic novels; it has a good series of stories held together by a coherent overall arc and a brace of interesting characters. It also has nothing to do with Machine Civilization.
About a week ago on A Writer’s Path (a super resource), I read an article about why a writer should, basically, “stay on message;” if you do SF, do SF. If you write romance, write romance. Given that I’ve written SF, religion, magic, romance, horror, friendship all through visual novels, traditional novels, websites, and picture books, I considered that to be a crock of shit. In fact, I’ve very deliberately chosen to change genres, just to see what I can do.
However, there might be a useful nugget there still: while I have used different characters and settings to tell different stories, they’ve – so far – all been in my future history, Machine Civilization. Mulling on that – and that I think steampunk is much better suited for a visual medium – I put the Reilly story away. Again. So, what to do? There on the sidebar (or in the Menu, depending on how you’re viewing this) is my free novel/writing experiment, “Defiant.” It’s just possible that I could edit Acts 1-3 into Part 1 of 2 of another novel (and that would be a lot of editing! It was never designed to be a free-standing story!). It has some romantic elements that I could turn up or down, as well as a strong military theme. Some politics, but not so much that my head starts spinning by page five (as it did with ‘Crosses & Doublecrosses).
Then again, having just come off of a novel, do I want to undertake something big again? Would maybe two or three short stories be better both to keep me writing and the creative process engaged? Short stories can also be scaled up, witness, ‘It’s Just Business’ (that was the original title) turning into ‘Cursed Hearts.’
Sighing into my computer screen, I imagine Ai’s family, Nichole’s family, and anyone left alive at Neuroi Corporation, sighing back at me, wondering when Stupid Writer will tell more of their stories. Apologies, friends: I’m trying.
