25 June, 2011
My novel Cawnpore is now live on Amazon’s Kindle Store and B&N’s Nook store. Set in 1857 during the India Mutiny, it follows the exploits of a political officer trying to uncover and stop sedition in the court of the local potentate, Nana Sahib.
Head on over and buy a copy for the exorbitant price of $1.99!
Here’s the first three chapters as a preview.
24 June, 2011
I’ve been busting out a bunch of work this last two weeks: I have a piece that’s going into an anthology called Why We Left the Left, the first chapter for the new Victoriana sourcebook on technology has been submitted and more work is forthcoming, and I’ve finished proofreading and formatting Cawnpore — my historical novel about the 1857 India Mutiny — is completed. Once I’ve got my ISBN assigned for this version, it should go live on iBooks, Kindle, and Nook in a few days. My retelling of Perseus is next up for the editing/proofing and I hope to have that out by the end of the summer.
For all you readers out there, they’ll be priced competitively for the ebook version — probably $0.99 to start — so if you’ve been enjoying the material on the website, help me stay solvent enough to put more attention toward the blog and game-oriented projects. Cawnpore‘s been in print and epublication before (way back in 2000! Who says I’m not a trendsetter!?!) and has gotten decent reviews and traffic before, but any help will be appreciated. There will be a few chapters put up on the blog in a few days, so people can decide if it’s for them. I’ll do the same with Perseus once it’s ready…
Still on the schedule is a new espionage game system which will have its roots in the old JB:007 system of the 1980s. We’ve begun playtesting some of the new rules in our gaming group, and once there’s more verbiage worked through, I may be looking for playtesters. I’m thinking I might Kickstart that project soon.
UPDATE: Cawnpore is in the Kindle and Nook store pipeline. Estimate availability by Monday. iBooks is going to have to wait, as I don’t have the $100 for an ISBN number and the aggregator providers are a bit sketchy, in my book.
17 June, 2011
The local supermarket actually have swordfish steaks on sale for $6/lb. and since it’s one of my favorite foods, I thought I’d take my first crack at cooking it.
Take big-@$$ swordfish steaks, slather them in garlic butter and parsley with some cracked black pepper. Throw on the grill (I used the ol’ Foreman grill for this last night.) Keep adding garlic butter every 2 minutes or so until done — about 7 minutes for an inch thick steak. Should come out moist and fork-cutting tender.
I paired it with couscous that had white raisins, cashews, sweet peas, and a bit of parmesan cheese.
A nice not-too-sweet white would go well with it.
9 June, 2011
What you need for ubercool: night, cool car, the right music:
6 June, 2011
Here’s a pic from outside my living room showing the smoke from Arizona. It’s bad enough we’ve had to shut all the windows and turn off the swamp cooler…meaning it’s about to get HOT in the house.
The camera kept trying to auto-correct the sky colors and the flash was the only way to trick it into showing the actual color.
I went out a few minutes ago and you could see the particular matter in the air in the headlights; all the other lights were haloing and starring from the refraction. Horrible breathing conditions.
On the up side, the atmospherics gave me an idea for a mystery/modern western novel…
2 June, 2011
Finished work on my retelling if Perseus — it’s a pretty loyal telling of the original myth, but with more examination of the Olympians and their involvement. It’s being proofed and cover art is coming together and it should be hitting Kindle Store by midsummer.
The next, Cawnpore is a historical romance/war novel set during the Indian Mutiny of 1857. Anglo-Irish officer Richard Fortune arrives in the eponymous town on the eve of the outbreak of hostilities and is tasked with trying to keep the local potentate, Nana Sahib, placated over the new policy of “lapse”, where native rulers without issue had their lands and property seized by the East Indian Company on their passing. He falls for a dancing girl in Nana’s court and uses her as an asset to track sedition by members of the court. Unfortunately, the higher ups don’t believe that a mutiny will happen, and soon they are all fighting for their lives, trapped in a small fortification, surrounded by thousands of their former native soldiers. Reproofing the book, as the original proofs from publication have gone astray so I have to work from a preproduction version; should drop on the Kindle Store in July.
It looks like I’ll be doing more role playing game work for Cubicle 7, as well.
2 June, 2011
The original sucked (and not in the vampiric way)…this one looks like it could be good. Colin Farrell is playing the dickish vampire well, and David Tennant’s supposedly a scene-stealer as a Chris Angel-esque magician (the Roddy McDowell role in the original.)
28 May, 2011
I remember the original 1973 version scared the living piss out of me when I was a kid (I was eight or nine when I caught it on a Saturday horror fest on TV.) Del Toro’s producing, and it looks like it could be pretty taut.
17 May, 2011
Well, I was hoping to push a few posts out this weekend, but my mother was here visiting me, her new daughter-in-law and new grandchild. Since I haven’t seen my mother in seven years, it behooved me to actually spend time with her.
Posts coming tonight and tomorrow.
The cookout for her on Friday did provide a nice recipe for you guys:
Black Campbell Steak (or whatever you wanna call it)
Take a bunch of thin steaks and put them in a big container. Pour in enough beer (I used Blue Moon’s Summer Wheat) and bourbon to cover the meat — I did a 2 to 1 ratio (favor beer) and did dilute it a bit with water. I did six steaks, so I used about 4 cloves of chopped garlic, about a tsp each of oregano, parsley, basil, about double that sea salt and black pepper. Cover, shake a bit, refrigerate until an hour before cooking, then take it out, shake again.
Grill over an open flame for about 5-10 minutes depending on temperature. They should come out tasty and very, very moist. Succulent, you might say, were you inclined to it.
The Black Campbell 