Category: Books
Book of the Week: Conquistador.
Ah, Conquistador. Picked it up to look up something about farming, reread the whole thing. Alternate history, in which an officer (and Virginian fighting-man) discovers in 1946 a stable dimensional portal to a North America undiscovered by Europeans. It’s a great book, visibly showing the influences of Silver Age science fiction (particularly H. Beam Piper), but it’s also telling that S.M. Stirling needed to quote Niven’s Law* in the foreword. I imagine some of the hate mail was epic.
#commissionearned
*Well, one of Niven’s Laws:
There is a technical, literary term for those who mistake the opinions and beliefs of characters in a novel for those of the author.
The term is ‘idiot.’
04/05/2025 Snippet, In the Halls of the Lily King.
This may work better as this month’s story.
…
Continue reading 04/05/2025 Snippet, In the Halls of the Lily King.Kind of mixed feelings, right now.
On the one hand, I dislike tariffs*. On the other hand, I don’t like how the gaming and independent fiction industries talked themselves into using products and services from the People’s Republic of China, despite the fact that the PRC’s supply chain is corrupt and unreliable at best, uses wink-and-a-nudge slave labor at worst, is run by people who are ideologically opposed to several core principles of Western society, and is about as ecologically friendly as a guy spraying out chlorofluorocarbons from his extra-leaded gasoline-powered mobile throne while directing a Soviet-era hydroelectric project.
Continue reading Kind of mixed feelings, right now.04/02/2025 Snippet, BOOT.
The March Patreon stuff is up!
I feel the story went well this month, so of course nobody will agree with me. If so, I won’t even be mad about it. That’s just how the universe works.
Anyway…
Continue reading The March Patreon stuff is up!I may be doing RisuCon again after all.
RisuCon‘s moved the date to October 4th, moved the venue to the Montgomery County Fairgrounds, and – most importantly – slashed the table fee considerably. Half hour commute and a vendor fee I can make back means the venue has a lot more potential this means. Besides, I liked the staff. They were on top of stuff, last year. So I put in an application. I’ll keep you posted.
As always: if you can’t get to that, buy my books here!
#commissionearned
Book of the Week / In The Mail: Silverlock, Including the Silverlock Companion.
Happy birthday to me!
Although there’s a problem. Silverlock, Including the Silverlock Companion is pretty. In fact, it’s too pretty. I don’t want to actually open it, it’s so pretty and clean. It has glossaries. It has commentary, including by John Myers Myers himself. It has a bibliography. It has sheet music. Let me repeat that, to anyone who cares: IT HAS SHEET MUSIC.
I almost shudder at the thought of using this book. I may end up only reading it while wearing gloves.
#commissionearned
Snippet the Last, LE BETE.
And thank God. I mean, it needs to be smoothed out, but that can be another day.
…
Continue reading Snippet the Last, LE BETE.Ben Fleuter’s got a couple of comic anthologies up at his store.
Yes, yes, I need a store. Although what I actually need is a business manager, who can make stores and other things happen. Anyway: Ben’s got some new small-print anthologies up at his store. Check ’em out before they get sold out, and so forth.