Kacey Ezell's Blog, page 13
September 26, 2017
The Fedora Chronicles Interview!
[image error] The Fedora Chronicles Radio Show
So, at DragonCon, I had the opportunity to meet a really terrific gentleman named John Pyka, who also goes by the moniker Big Daddy Cool. John is an authority on all things Dieselpunk, and he invited me to take part in a podcast run by himself and his friend, Eric Renderking Fisk.
Thus, I had the opportunity to join them for an episode of The Fedora Chronicles. 
September 14, 2017
Surprise!
[image error]Great news! The second Four Horsemen Universe anthology is live on Amazon! In his social media spin up to its release, co-editor and publisher Chris Kennedy teased a little “surprise” to be included.
Well guess what? Surprise! I have a teeny tiny little story in this anthology, called “The Start of Something Beautiful”. It was a tiny vignette that wouldn’t leave me alone until I wrote it. So I did. And I sent it to Chris and Mark, and… well… there you go.
However, that leads to another question. The question you should be asking yourself is this: if this story is only the start, what’s coming after it? 
September 9, 2017
Forged In Blood is out!
Do you like swords?
How about completely kickass war stories that run the gamut from medieval Japan to spaceborne encounters with aliens and everything in between?
My friends. Have I got the book for you.
September 6, 2017
Dragon Con 2017 – After Action Report
DragonCon 2017
So I went to my first DragonCon in 2001. I skipped ’02 and ’03. Went to ’04, ’05, ’06, ’07, ’08. Skipped ’09 and ’10. Went to ’11, ’12, ’13, and ’14. Skipped ’15, went to ’16 and now ’17. That’s 12 years of cons, which kinda blows my mind.
[image error]The Amazon Warriors – one of the phenomenally funny group cosplays I saw this year.
As an event, it’s grown exponentially in the 15ish years since I started attending. I went to that first con in 2001 with my best friend from pilot training, Tammy Archuleta. I’d wager that our experience as first-timers was pretty common: that is to say, we had no idea what we were walking into. Unbeknownst to both of us, we were about to come home.
And that’s a feeling that has never changed. Despite all its faults, despite all the hordes of people. Despite the occasional asshole or groups of assholes. Despite my original “con family” slowly having to decrease their attendance due to real life, totally valid reasons, when I walk in through the front doors of the Hyatt Regency Atlanta and see the logo projected onto a floor teeming with Stormtroopers, Hogwarts students, Na’avi, and scions of House Lannister… I’m home.
Wednesday, 30 August 17
The rumors are true. Wednesday is, indeed, the new Thursday. We hopped a flight from Baltimore at some ungodly hour of the morning and arrived in Atlanta some time around 10am. The good news was that the MARTA was totally uncrowded, even with our luggage. We had zero problems getting to Peachtree Center Station, and emerged into daylight to see something that looked eerily like Tuesdays of years past. The Atlanta streets teemed with workday traffic, mixed heavily with people already rocking the cosplays. The party had already begun.
Once again, we stayed at the Westin Peachtree Plaza. Due in part to Hurricane Harvey, we had some cancellation questions with our reservation. After we checked in, I asked to speak with a manager to ask these questions. Shoutout to the manager, Casey Ladner, who not only answered my questions, but saw me reimbursed on the spot. He also FULLY refunded my friend Marisa’s reservation(including the non-refundable deposit!), since she couldn’t get out of Houston in time to come to DragonCon. Thanks for being a standup guy, sir. And thanks to the Westin for enabling him to make that call.
Even though we were a solid 5 hours earlier than standard check in time, our room was ready. Once again, the Westin went above and beyond and let us check in. So up to the room we went, and proceeded to kick off our “grown up vacation” in the best of styles.
By taking a nap. It was glorious. Those of you with kids and/or variable work schedules will understand.
After our nap, I got notification of some of our friends filtering in. We met up with Mike Massa and his lovely wife, who were staying in the room next door. He, along with Chris Smith, joined us for lunch/dinner (meals at DragonCon are often eaten at off times, it seems) at the incomparable Meehan’s. While there, our friend Seth (best man at my wedding six years ago!) joined us, and the party began to grow.
We wandered over to the Hyatt bar and met up with a few other friends, including my mentor and senior author, John Ringo. For those of you waiting with bated breath, yes, John, Chris, and I did discuss our upcoming work Gunpowder and Embers. I think you’re going to be happy with the result. More to come on that soon.
We had started talking on the Hyatt smoking deck, but an enthusiastic partier with a drum showed up and started to drown out our conversation, so we took the party upstairs to Chris’s room. There we hung out, talked books and plots and various other things until about 2, when we decided we should probably start pacing ourselves and go to bed. There were, after all, 5 days of con left to go. 
August 29, 2017
My Final DragonCon 2017 Schedule!
Hey Cool Kids!
August 28, 2017
Cover Art!
Guess what? I have a cover!
August 17, 2017
Pimping My Friends – John F. Holmes
So one of the things I want to do on this site, besides market my own work, is market the work of my friends and colleagues. My buddy John F. Holmes has a new book out in a brand new swashbuckling series called The Cumberland Chronicles. [image error]
Isn’t that a cool cover?
Here’s the description from the Amazon Page:
There are many planes to the multiverse. Some, like ours, are grounded in the reality of the physical laws, and there are rules we have to live by. Some others, though, are based on magic, with gods who interfere in mortal lives. Likewise, there are societies where you have to live by rules and laws. In every universe, though, there are those who refuse to live by the bounds civilization sets on them. We call them pirates, outlaws, and renegades. They call themselves free.
This is one of those planes of the multiverse that has both magic and men who call themselves free, and this is their story.
Brian Cumberland has been many things; slave, mercenary, royal bodyguard, and more. Now, though, he and his brother Tristan command the privateer Widowmaker, sailing the four seas looking for freedom and adventure. When a ghost from Brian’s past reappears in his life, he is sent on a quest which will take him to the very gates of death.
Sounds legit, right? So, if you feel so inclined, go check it out here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074TYDW9P And if you end up reading it, do John and me both a solid and leave a review!
Thanks! You guys are the best.
August 13, 2017
DragonCon 2017 – Tentative Schedule
Let’s talk for a few minutes about the single biggest weekend of the year: the first weekend in September. Otherwise known in the US as Labor Day weekend.
But for me and roughly 80,000 of my closest friends, it has a totally different name: DragonCon.
DragonCon is my Super Bowl, my Mardi Gras, my New Year’s Eve all rolled into one. From the first day I wandered into the Hyatt Regency Atlanta in 2001, Dragon Con has been my home planet. If you’re geeky at all, and you’ve been there… then you know.
For the second year in a row, I’m honored to be participating in programing as an Attending Professional. Here’s my tentative* schedule. Come out and see me if you can!
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Title: Here comes the gener-AL!
Description: What makes a great general in Fantasy?
Time: Fri 04:00 pm Location: Embassy EF – Hyatt (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: Myke Cole, Michael Livingston, Kacey Ezell, Jonathan P Brazee, Elizabeth Moon)
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Title: World at war: Alternate history in the early 20th century
Description: The first decades of the 20th century have proven to be fertile ground for alternate historians. From German victories to Soviet domination, from the mundane to the fantastic, this panel looks at the various alternate takes on this crucial period of world history.
Time: Fri 07:00 pm Location: Augusta – Sheraton (Length: 1 Hour)
Moderator / MC for panel
(Tentative Panelists: Van Allen Plexico, Kacey Ezell, Michael Livingston, Taylor Anderson)
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Title: More than Gears: The Neo-Pulp and Dieselpunk Author Roundtable
Description: Dieselpunk and neo-pulp, steampunk’s historical next-door neighbors, present unique challenges for the storyteller who wants to use those settings. Listen to our panel of authors discuss the challenges, and the fun, of writing about a diesel-burning generation
Time: Sat 07:00 pm Location: Augusta – Sheraton (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: James Palmer, Bobby Nash, Kacey Ezell, D.Alan Lewis, Van Allen Plexico)
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Title: No Kidding, There I Was…War Stories
Description: The only people who like to tell stories more than writers are veterans. Our panelists are both, from all branches of the service. These are the stories that informed their work.
Time: Sat 11:30 pm Location: Embassy AB – Hyatt (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: John D. Ringo, Elizabeth Moon, Todd McCaffrey, Mike Massa, Kacey Ezell, Christopher L Smith)
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Title: The History or Alternate History Game Show
Description: This is a game show in which our panel of authors and chosen contestants from the crowd are read stories and their own wits must decide whether the event is fact or imagination for fun and prizes. It’s a game of truth or speculative fiction that is sure to be educational, if not hilarious.
Time: Sun 02:30 pm Location: Athens – Sheraton (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: S.M. Stirling, Cherie Priest, Kacey Ezell, Bill Fawcett)
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Title: Playing in Someone Else’s Universe
Description: The rise of indie publishing and crowdfunding has led to an increase in shared world anthologies and other projects, many in well-established fictional universes. Panelists discuss the challenges they’ve faced adapting to worlds not of their own making.
Time: Sun 05:30 pm Location: Embassy AB – Hyatt (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: Jean Marie Ward, Dr. Charles E. Gannon, Kacey Ezell, Todd McCaffrey, Griffin Barber)
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Title: Basic Military Science Fiction
Description: Most military sf tends to have a lot of the same underpinnings. Ranks, equipment, tactics. What can make a particular work stand out? Are there things that are required to make it military sf? Our panelists discuss.
Time: Sun 08:30 pm Location: Embassy AB – Hyatt (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: Jack Campbell, Kacey Ezell, Marc Alan Edelheit, Doug Dandridge, Mike Massa, Evan Currie, J A Sutherland)
——————-
Title: Women in the Military: Real-World Issues and SciFi Applications
Description: In a male-dominated field like the military, with lives on the line, women have excelled–and we’re not just talking Wonder Woman. We will hear some of the real-world issues and concerns of women serving in the military and discuss how these manifest in military science fiction.
Time: Mon 01:00 pm Location: Chastain DE – Westin (Length: 1 Hour)
(Tentative Panelists: Kacey Ezell, Janine K. Spendlove)
(* – EVERYTHING at DragonCon is tentative until it’s already happened. It is known.)
August 12, 2017
On The Nature Of Family
Family is one of those loaded words with a whole host of meanings. I’ve always maintained that people have the family into which they’re born, and the family that they choose. Both are important, but their relative importance changes based on the individual circumstances, etc.
Anyway, none of that is the point of this post. The point is that family is about connection. And that connection is what is interesting to me.
My name is Kacey Ezell, and I write about the connections between stuff. Between people and things or ideas. Between what happened in history and what if something else had happened instead. Between the world around us and the world that we just might yet dream into being.
Welcome to the Family.
