Austin Worley's Blog: Writing, Reading, and Living with Austin Worley, page 13

Update: August 2021

Summer is drawing to a close, kids are headed back to school, and August itself is flying by, which means it’s time for another monthly update!

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I’ve spent almost the entire month revising and editing my superhero fantasy novel The Silver Shrike. At this point, I’m on Chapter 25 (out of 32) and only have one more significant revision left on the checklist I whipped up in March. Good progress, if I do say so myself!

The last revision isn’t huge, especially compared to the partial rewrites of two scenes in Chapters 8 & 9, so there’s a decent chance I’ll manage to wrap up this draft next week. Hopefully early next week. I’d like the chance to brush over it one more time before the next #PitMad at the start of September, then start on a few other projects.

One of those projects is an opportunity offered to me just this past Thursday. Jennifer Jackson of Reader’s Magnet has invited me to write an article about “An Oath to the Sun”, my contribution to Murder & Mayhem: A Dragon Soul Press Anthology, so I’m looking to tackle that as soon edits on The Silver Shrike are finished.

The next project I have my eye on is the sword & sorcery tale starring Arlise Dun that I mentioned outlining back in the July update. It’s a fairly straightforward short story, so I’m hopeful I can whip it up quickly and submit it to Whetstone before their Issue #4 deadline. If not, there are always other markets.

Over the last week, I’ve been chewing on an idea for a military sci-fi romance. Is that a thing? Because if not, I’m seriously tempted to make that subgenre a thing. My only problem is deciding to whether to go with this idea for my next novel, write a Whippoorwill novel, or write a sequel for The Silver Shrike.

On the reading side of things, I’m still working my way through a reread of the Honor Harrington series so I can pick up Uncompromising Honor. Mission of Honor and A Rising Thunder are a little tricky to follow if you haven’t read the spinoff series, so I’m rereading those as well. Currently, I’m a little over halfway through The Shadow of Saganami. While I enjoy the fleet battle and strategic view of the later books in the main series, Saganami excels at one of the things which drew me in in the first place: small ship-to-ship actions and tightly focused geopolitics.

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My contributor’s copy of Murder & Mayhem came in earlier this month, and I was pleasantly surprised to discover “An Oath to the Sun” was the very first story in the anthology. It’s always wonderful to see an editor believe in the quality of your work to the point they’re willing to let it form a reader’s first impressions of their book. I’m not too far in yet, but the stories look pretty promising.

If you’d like to check it out for yourself, you can find the anthology here.

Summer vacation for my little brothers ended this week, so everyone’s adjusting to the new schedule. Only one is doing virtual this year, so I don’t think I’ll be stretched quite as thin playing teacher as I was last year, but you never know. I spent so much of Friday helping with an English essay I didn’t have the chance to work of The Silver Shrike. Hopefully that doesn’t become the norm. I’d like to be at least a little productive during Fall and Winter.

Our dear governor has banned mask and vaccine mandates in public schools despite rising case numbers and buckling healthcare system, so I’m a little worried despite my family’s vaccinations. Stay safe out there folks. I’ll see y’all again in September!

“An Oath to the Sun” Excerpt #2

Only a couple more days until the release of Murder & Mayhem! Here’s another excerpt from my contribution, the superhero mystery novelette “An Oath to the Sun”. In this one, we get our first look at the bizarre details surrounding the demise of Ramzi Zahran.

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While she thumbed through the casefile, Madi switched to her prosecutor voice.

“Late on April 7th, Corporal Ontrel Robertson of the Oklahoma City Police Department pulled over Ramzi Zahran—an application engineer with Armstrong PumpWorks—after observing him struggle to maintain his lane. When Corporal Robertson approached the vehicle, he immediately smelled alcohol and asked Mr. Zahran to perform a breathalyzer test. This revealed his blood alcohol content was .26, over three times the legal limit. Corporal Robertson informed Mr. Zahran he was under arrest.

“Mr. Zahran—who up until this point had remained placid despite apparent visual hallucinations—knocked him down and began bashing his skull against the asphalt. Fearing for his life, Corporal Robertson drew his service pistol and fired three shots at point-blank range. All of them struck Mr. Zahran, who died at the scene.”

Topsannah crossed her arms as she circled the bed. “Sounds like a pretty clear-cut case.”

“Until you read the toxicology report.”

Brow furrowed, she took the papers Madi offered and began to read by the flickering light of the television. One chemical turned up over and over. “Methanol?!”

Madi nodded. “And present at almost twice the minimum lethal blood concentration. This isn’t some run-of-the-mill DUI where the suspect assaults an officer in the hopes of escape; somebody poisoned Ramzi Zahran.”

If you’d like to read more, you can still preorder Murder & Mayhem here until Friday.

“An Oath to the Sun” Excerpt #1

With the launch of Murder & Mayhem just a week away, I’d like to share a couple excerpts from my contribution: the superhero mystery novelette “An Oath to the Sun”. This first one is also the first page of the story. Enjoy!

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By the time Whippoorwill clambered through the second-story window, all she wanted was a hug. Gunshots still rang in her ears. Shoulda moved faster. No. Rushing a standoff meant sloppiness. Mistakes. Then again, could any mistake be worse than arriving just a few seconds too late to save three little kids from their own father?

Self-recriminations died as she swept her gaze over the bedroom. Spirits! Dozens of casefiles littered the floor, punctuated every now and then by wads of crumpled-up legal paper. Even more files blanketed the bed, where two hefty volumes on criminal law lay wide open. In the middle of all this chaos, Madison Harper curled up with a third tome as a pillow. Auburn curls piled atop her head in a messy bun, and drool soaked the sleeve of her wrinkled Harvard Crimson sweatshirt.

Whippoorwill grinned. This…this was exactly what she loved most about Madi: her dedication. That relentless drive to see justice served, even if it required personal sacrifice. Something we share. Sure, Madi fought crime with legal motions and clever arguments while she favored escrima and pepperballs, but they wielded those weapons for the same reason. No wonder they worked so well together. No wonder they’d become lovers.

Careful to avoid stepping on anything important, she tiptoed toward the bed. Loose papers rustled as her cape swept over them, but a rerun of the evening news drowned out the noise. Tapping her cowl to disable its voice modulator, Whippoorwill knelt beside Madi and whispered the same words she always used to open their midnight trysts. “Hello, Madame District Attorney.”

Update: July 2021

There’s something about the month of July that always makes me feel a little…bittersweet. Like you’ve made it through wonderful times and now you’re facing a slow slide downhill. Maybe that’s just a relic from years of summer vacation, but I’m definitely feeling it this year.

July started with my latest round of submissions for “Folk of Rock and Water”. A few more rejections have already landed in my inbox, but I’m very hopeful this latest query will bring an acceptance. Only time will tell.

In between prepping my novella for those submissions, I’ve been outlining a few more short stories. One is a straightforward sword & sorcery piece starring Arlise Dun, set a little after “Lightning Between Your Fingers”. Depending on its length, I plan on sending it to either Whetstone or Savage Realms. The other is a horror story which serves as a very distant sequel to “Hooves and Tobacco on a Sunday Morning”. Last but not least, I’m hoping I can finish writing and revising the military sci-fi tale I mentioned a few months back in time for an August 6th deadline.

I’m also exploring the possibility of becoming an assignment writer for Level 4 Press. As part of the application process, they’ve sent me an outline they’d like me to follow for a thousand word sample. I plan on working on that over this weekend or early next week. Fingers crossed they like my sample enough to offer me a position!

On Wednesday, I had a meeting with the editor I mentioned back in the June Update. We mostly talked about the kind of work Realm is seeking: episodic audio plays, especially with a speculative fiction bent. It was both informative and intriguing. I’ve never written anything with a script before, but it’s an opportunity I wouldn’t mind exploring. She sent me some documents that go into more detail on their guidelines and process, so I might try my hand at something tailored for them if I find an open spot in my schedule.

On the reading front, I’m continuing my journey back through Honor Harrington. I’m currently on In Enemy Hands. However, I’ve also sprinkled some other books in between to make sure I don’t get burnt out on sci-fi. One of those is West of the Tularosa, a collection of eight western short stories by Louis L’Amour. I’m nearing the end of the collection, having just dipped my toe into the titular story.

Hopefully all my fellow Americans reading this had a lovely Fourth of July and are enjoying the rest of their summer. I know I am, especially since we caught a glimpse of the Mars/Venus conjunction earlier this week. Venus set behind the neighbor’s house just a few minutes after we took a look at it, I’m glad we hauled out the telescope when we did. The thins crescent moon and Vega also offered us some really neat views. I’d hoped to show my little brother Albireo, but light pollution makes navigating the skies tricky and we were getting swarmed with mosquitoes. Nevertheless, I managed to escape with a single bite. At least it hasn’t itched as much as they usually do!

Don’t forget: Murder and Mayhem releases on July 30th! Check it out here if you’d like to read my latest novelette, “An Oath to the Sun”. If you want a little taste first, I’m planning on posting some excerpts over the next couple weeks. Contractually, I can’t show you too much, but I hope you’ll enjoy the glimpses I can offer.

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Until then, take care!

Update: June 2021

You know what they say about best laid plains? Well, my June ended up looking very different from the plans I described back in the May update. Quite a bit busier, too. This month has been full of ups and downs, so let’s dive on in…

While I’d originally planned to prep “The Death of Liberty?” for publication and dive into revisions on my novel again, I discovered a call for submissions which caught my eye: erotica geared towards men and the male experience. My wheels started turning immediately, and it didn’t take long before I’d settled on a protagonist.

Those of you who’ve read “The Gale at Quiet Cove” may remember Earc Mac Toghda, the selkie man who called on Arlise Dun and her comrades to save his people from a months-long magical storm. His interactions with Arlise carried this undercurrent of mutual attraction and sexual tension which never gets completely resolved, although the promise of a resolution is in the final scene. So why not actually show the resolution this time?

In “The Gale at Quiet Cove”, Earc is confident and forward with Arlise…though some vulnerability does shine through at a few points. Writing from his perspective offered me a unique opportunity to explore that vulnerability in depth. Underneath the confidence and flirtatiousness, Earc harbors a small bundle of insecurities. He’s drawn to Arlise by everything she’s done to help his people and wants to offer his affection as a way of showing his thanks—a play on the more typical “Hero slays the monster and gets the damsel” setup—but he fears any relationship will only bring both of them heartache.

Earc also fears he’s not good enough for a woman as remarkable as Arlise because of how utterly powerless he was to protect the other selkies in “The Gale at Quiet Cove”. This aspect of him showcases the theme I really wanted to hone in on with this story. Society has some very old ideas of what it means to be a man, but those ideas are unnecessarily rigid. You don’t need to be an all-conquering hero of legend to be worthy of love.

Walking Earc through these insecurities was a fun, and sometimes challenging, experience. This story was probably the most character-driven piece I’ve ever written, and together with “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill” it really opened my eyes to the storytelling potential of romance and sexuality.

The publisher should respond by the end of July, so hopefully I’ll have good news by the time I write my next monthly update. If “Enough” does get accepted, it’ll be my first story published under a pseudonym. Well, an initialism. I don’t have a problem with being tied to the story, but I’d like to minimize any snap judgements of me or the story from those who haven’t read it and erotica/erotic romance is pretty far outside what I normally write, so it makes sense to keep it at arm’s length.

Since I spent most of June working on “Enough”, I decided to delay publication of “The Death of Liberty?” for now. Juggling the search for a good cover artist and final edits and promoting pre-orders while simultaneously trying to write a story as challenging as “Enough” seemed like too much. That means the July 6th launch date simply isn’t realistic anymore, which is just as well considering one of my other titles is launching at the end of them month. Once I’ve found a good alternative, I’ll be sure to let everyone know.

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Speaking of that book launch, Murder & Mayhem—which includes my latest Whippoorwill tale, “An Oath to the Sun”—is currently set for a July 30th release date. And it’s available for pre-order here right now!

On Monday, I finally heard back on that full #PitMad request on “Folk of Rock and Water”. It’s not everyday a four time Hugo Award-nominated editor tells you that your writing impressed her and your novella was “strongly told”, so I’m pretty happy even though she opted not to accept the story. She’s currently seeking stories suited to be audio dramas, and I have to agree with her that the action scenes in “Folk of Rock and Water” mean it’s better off as a traditional book or audiobook. Nevertheless, we’ve scheduled a Zoom meeting to discuss her publication and the possibility of me writing a new story specifically geared towards it. What an amazing opportunity!

Implementing a space battle in a rewrite of an old story led me to dust off The Honor of the Queen, which inspired me to dive back into the Honorverse with a full-on reread of the series. Is there any space battle in science fiction better than the final ship-to-ship duel of the book, where Honor leads the battered HMS Fearless on a death ride against the battlecruiser Thunder of God to defend Grayson from a planetary genocide? I’m only on Field of Dishonor right now, but I’m looking forward to finishing off the series. I was in the middle of writing my novel when Uncompromising Honor came out, so I never got around to reading the last book.

On the homefront, we lost a close family friend this week after a long battle with COVID complications. I’m still in that phase where it doesn’t quite feel real yet, which will probably last until the funeral on Friday. It’ll be the largest gathering I’ve attended since the pandemic began, but now that I’m fully vaccinated I feel obligated to be there for my best friend and his family. If you’re eligible for the vaccine but don’t plan on getting one, I beg you to reconsider. There’s enough misery and suffering in this world without leaving the door open for even more.

Hopefully this post finds you well, or at least better than I’m feeling at the moment. See you again in July…

Retrospective: Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill

The cover of Under The Cape, which includes this story

For this last #ThrowbackThursday post, we’re taking a look back at my first foray into romance: “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill”.

Topsannah Price just wants to protect people. To shield them from street crime, costumed criminals, and all the other horrors she faces every night as the Whippoorwill. That’s why she donned the cowl in the first place…and why she left her girlfriend Madi in the dark about the details of her vigilante activities.

After all those secrets destroyed their relationship, Oklahoma County DA Madison Harper knows she ought to forget about the dashing Comanche heroine and focus on putting dirty cops like the Bricktown Boys behind bars. But when the Whippoorwill discovers a five-million-dollar contract on Madi’s life and rescues her from the superpowered hitman Ironsides, forgetting becomes impossible…

My inspiration for this story came when I found the theme for Silk & Steel, an anthology from Cantina Press, in late 2019.  They wanted “stories of high adventure that feature one weapon-wielding woman and one woman whose strengths lie in softer skills, but who is just as powerful in her own right. You’re free to choose any setting – from historical to modern to wildly futuristic.”

I’d already spent some time sketching out a few superhero stories set in Oklahoma, so the broad idea of the Whippoorwill had already taken shape: a street-level vigilante dedicated to stamping out crime and corruption in the state following an economic meltdown. Above all else, I wanted this character to embody everything wonderful about Oklahoma.  To be quintessentially Oklahoman.  And who could be more quintessentially Oklahoman than a descendant of people who’d called this land home for centuries?

Thus was born Topsannah Price.  As a vigilante specialized in martial arts such as escrima, she fit ‘steel’ perfectly.

From there, I started looking into ‘softer’ skills which could still have agency in an adventure plot while simultaneously contrasting a vigilante as a romantic partner.  Prosecutor leapt out right away.  Not only did it lend an element of the forbidden to the romance, but the idea of an incorruptible prosecutor crusading against crime and corruption also nicely complemented Topsannah’s motives.  After a little more character building, I had my character for ‘silk’: Oklahoma County District Attorney Madison Harper.

Now that I’d nailed down both of my leads, I turned to crafting an adventure/romantic suspense plot which could incorporate the strengths of both characters.  Incorruptibility making Madi a target seemed like the perfect way to kick off the story, so I started fleshing out the villains: a group of dirty cops known as the Bricktown Boys and the superpowered hitman Ironsides, who they’d hired to eliminate the only prosecutor brave enough to charge them for their crimes.

Due to the length restrictions, I decided the romantic dimension of the story would work best if they already had some history together.  The demanding nature of their jobs and Topsannah’s standoffishness seemed like the perfect recipe for a breakup, so I decided to make this a second-chance romance.

Although Silk & Steel didn’t end up buying the story, I’m glad I found their call for submissions. If I hadn’t, I probably never would’ve written “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill”. And that would be a shame. Personally, I think it might be my best story ever.  The action, romance, and character development all came together perfectly.

If this post has piqued your interest, you can find “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill” in Under The Cape: An Anthology of Superhero Romance from Riverdale Avenue Books.

Acceptance!

This morning, I woke up to some fantastic news: my superhero mystery novelette “An Oath to the Sun” has been accepted for publication in the Dragon Soul Press anthology Murder and Mayhem!

I’m so excited for the opportunity to share another Whippoorwill story with the world. Like I mentioned in yesterday’s monthly update, it’s a straight up murder mystery rather than romantic suspense like “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill”. Nevertheless, I’m sure readers who enjoyed the characters and setting will love the opportunity to dive deeper into this world.

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In case you missed yesterday’s update, here’s a little teaser from my query letter:

After a standoff goes horribly wrong, Topsannah Price—better known as the vigilante Whippoorwill—responds to a call from District Attorney Madison Harper in the hopes of taking her mind off the tragedy.  At first, the case she presents seems clear-cut.  Ramzi Zahran was pulled over by Oklahoma City Police on suspicion of DUI and gunned down when he attacked an officer.  However, the toxicology report reveals he was under the influence of a lethal dose of methanol.  District Attorney Harper suspects foul play, but her staff are overworked, and the police refuse to investigate further.  Only the Whippoorwill can get to the bottom of this case before the poisoner’s trail goes cold.

After an interview with the victim’s widow Jasra reveals he may have been the target of retaliation for whistleblowing on his employer, Whippoorwill swears a traditional Comanche oath to the Sun that she will deliver the family justice.  But it’s not long before new evidence implicates Jasra herself.  When Whippoorwill digs deeper into the case, she discovers even more suspects and a possible conspiracy stretching across the entire state.  Can she keep her oath to the Sun?  Or will this case prove too much even for the seasoned vigilante?

Last I heard, the publisher is aiming for a July release. Until then, I’ll be sure to keep you guys posted on any developments!

Update: May 2021

At long last, we’re nearing the end of this virtual school year.  You know what that means?  I can finally dive back into writing regularly!  But that’s the future; let me fill you in on what I’ve been up to lately…

Like I mentioned in my last monthly update, I decided to write a new short story starring Whippoorwill.  Well, it started as a short story.  By the time I finished “An Oath to the Sun” with two days to spare before the April 30th deadline, it had blossomed into a 13k word novelette.  I can’t believe how easily the words flowed from my fingertips.  It’s been a while since my average daily wordcount hovered around a thousand.  Hopefully, this breakthrough continues over this summer.  I have so many ideas to bring to life.

While “Law, Love, and the Whippoorwill” was superhero romantic suspense, “An Oath to the Sun” is pure unadulterated murder mystery.  Here’s a sneak peak at my query letter:

After a standoff goes horribly wrong, Topsannah Price—better known as the vigilante Whippoorwill—responds to a call from District Attorney Madison Harper in the hopes of taking her mind off the tragedy.  At first, the case she presents seems clear-cut.  Ramzi Zahran was pulled over by Oklahoma City Police on suspicion of DUI and gunned down when he attacked an officer.  However, the toxicology report reveals he was under the influence of a lethal dose of methanol.  District Attorney Harper suspects foul play, but her staff are overworked, and the police refuse to investigate further.  Only the Whippoorwill can get to the bottom of this case before the poisoner’s trail goes cold.

After an interview with the victim’s widow Jasra reveals he may have been the target of retaliation for whistleblowing on his employer, Whippoorwill swears a traditional Comanche oath to the Sun that she will deliver the family justice.  But it’s not long before new evidence implicates Jasra herself.  When Whippoorwill digs deeper into the case, she discovers even more suspects and a possible conspiracy stretching across the entire state.  Can she keep her oath to the Sun?  Or will this case prove too much even for the seasoned vigilante?

The publisher is supposed to respond to my submission by the end of May, so hopefully I’ll have some good news to share with you in next month’s update!

So far this month, I’ve strung together a few more verses of “The Song of the Liberator”.  My latest haiku should be on DeviantArt today, too.  Otherwise, I’m relaxing after my relentless pace in April, helping round out the virtual school year, and plotting my next projects.  I’m leaning towards some final tweaks to “The Death of Liberty?” and finding a cover artist so I can self-publish the story on Amazon by July 6th.  Six months since the attack on the Capitol seems fitting, given the conflict of TDoL revolves around a plot against democracy.  Once that’s done, I plan to dive into revisions on The Silver Shrike.

April didn’t give me much time to read, but I did manage to finish Conflict of Interest.  It’s a surprisingly sweet story despite the heavy—and I mean heavy—subject matter.

Conflict of Interest by Jae

Now, I’m on to Sidekick: The Red Raptor Files.  It’s always great to find fresh superhero prose. I’d really love to see the subgenre takeoff, and books like this one do a great job of showcasing its potential.

Sidekick by Christopher J. Valin

In other news, I received my second dose of the Pfizer vaccine at the tail end of April and crossed into maximum immunity last week.  Not having to worry about passing COVID-19 along to vulnerable family members is a huge weight off my shoulders. And now that vaccinations are open to 12–15-year-olds, the rest of the family can get vaccinated too.  Things are really looking up!

Hopefully, a cover for “The Death of Liberty?” will be ready to reveal by June.  Until then, take care!

Retrospective: The Gale at Quiet Cove

The cover of Unreal: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction: Volume 1, which includes this story.

After taking some time off to write my latest novelette, I’m back with another #ThrowbackThursday story retrospective.  This week’s tale is one I refused to give up on: “The Gale at Quiet Cove”.

After a month on the road battling monsters and magic, Knight-Lieutenant Arlise Dun just wants a hot bath and a decent meal. Not conversation with some selkie at Quiet Cove. But when Earc Mac Toghda tells her about the mysterious storm plaguing his people, she vows to discover who—or what—is behind it. Faced with wild magic, an unruly subordinate, and her own self-loathing, Arlise must battle monsters both real and imagined in order to unravel the mystery behind the gale at Quiet Cove.

My inspiration for this story came all the way back in 2017, when I found a call for submissions seeking hopeful fantasy stories centered around the theme of “still waters”.  A conflict centered around restoring literal still waters immediately came to mind, and I dove into worldbuilding around it.  Where are these turbulent waters in need of calming?  Why do they need to be calmed?  And what’s stirring them up in the first place?

Since I’d already outlined a novel about Arlise which begins on the forested island of Vyspa, I decided it made perfect sense to set this story there as a sort of prequel.  Even better, Vyspan culture draws heavily on the Irish and other Insular Celts…which made the mythical selkies a natural fit for this story.  Perhaps a supernatural storm left coastal waters too choppy for the local selkie colony to hunt safely, threatening them with starvation.

This still left the problem of the reason for the storm in the first place.  Whatever the cause, it had to be something which warranted somebody calling on the Order of Watchers.  The idea of some magic-wielding creature from the depths of the ocean seized my mind and refused to let go.  Similar monsters have captured the human imagination for millennia, from Charybdis to Cthulhu, so a sea monster seemed like the perfect antagonist for this story.  Especially since the Order wouldn’t know have much information on such creatures.

Once the culprit for the storm was settled, I set about fleshing it out.  The description of the kraken as a “crab-fish” by Swedish author Jacob Wallenberg and the arachas from The Witcher 3 inspired the krache: a towering crablike monster which wields crude magic and comes ashore to lay its eggs once every century.  The storm?  A way to protect its nesting site.

I also decided to weave the theme of still waters into the internal struggle Arlise grapples with throughout the story.  After months facing endless waves of arcane threats, she’s starting to wonder whether her work has value.  The world never seems to stay saved for long.  And if the Order can’t “still the waters of the world”, would she be better off seeking redemption some other way?

Over the next two and a half years, this story racked up almost a dozen rejections.  Most of them were razor close, too, which made them sting even more.  But it wasn’t all bad.  “The Gale at Quiet Cove” earned an Honorable Mention in the Writers of the Future Contest for Q3 2018, which I’m immensely proud of.  Invigorated by the knowledge I was on the right track with this story, I kept submitting.  An acceptance finally came in just before Christmas 2019.  Easily one of the best Christmas presents I’ve ever had.

“The Gale at Quiet Cove” is ultimately about finding value and purpose in small victories.  Sure, there will always be monsters.  People will always be in danger.  But this doesn’t mean protecting the innocent is worthless.  Many of the little things which make life worth living are only possible because of the people who confront darkness, danger, and the apparent futility of it all every single day.

If this novelette sounds interesting, you can find “The Gale at Quiet Cove” in Unreal: An Anthology of Speculative Fiction: Volume 1

Retrospective: Lightning Between Your Fingers

The original cover of Broadswords and Blasters #8, which includes this story

My #ThrowbackThursday story this week is “Lightning Between Your Fingers”, a fantasy mystery starring Knight-Sister Arlise Dun:

“A young woman slain, apparently by lightning. But she died indoors, and it hasn’t stormed in weeks. Arlise Dun has seen more than her share of strange cases during her service with the Order of Watchers, but this takes the cake. As she pieces together the clues surrounding Emerei Dawson’s death, a sordid tale of vice and corruption takes shape. Can Arlise solve the case before the perpetrators slip away?”

Back in early 2018, I discovered Broadswords and Blasters and immediately fell in love with the style best summarized by its subtitle: pulp with modern sensibilities. This was exactly what I’d spent years writing…and struggling to find a home for in the more literary pro-rate markets. After reading through the first four issues, I decided to craft a story just for them using elements common to the stories they’d published. A heroic fantasy setting. A murder mystery plot with a unique angle. A character capable of standing alongside the giants of the genre. Taking a break from novel pre-writing, I began to weave them together.

Since I’d always viewed my stories about Arlise and the other Watchers as fantasy mysteries, I decided to start with her and her world.  Both were already fleshed out. Next, I needed to make this murder mystery stand out. A strange method, possibly one involving magic or other fantasy elements, seemed like the best way to do that. Then it dawned on me: a coin. Such an innocuous object, almost beneath notice. But how would you kill somebody with a coin? And why?

Fortunately, my worldbuilding already had an answer to the first question. I’d first introduced the fantasy metal coryphium back in “Hanging at Crosbhothar” and edited into my then-unpublished draft of “The Gale at Quiet Cove” as capable of holding a magical charge. So, you could use a coin enchanted with an electrical spell as a murder weapon.

But who would mint coins made of coryphium? It’s very rare, so minting coryphium coins would reduce the supply available for enchanting. Only a country with powerful mages at its disposal would even consider it, as their abilities could balance out the loss in enchantments. One nation fit the bill: the Tyrian Dominion. This crumbling magocracy is the source of many problems the Watchers deal with, so a Tyrian murderer fit perfectly.

Next came the victim. I’ve always hated the way society turns a blind eye to crimes committed against the vulnerable people on its fringes. Members of minorities. The homeless. Men and women “of ill repute”. Nobody is disposable. Emphasizing this is why I decided Emerei Dawson would be a courtesan, and why I made sure to humanize her by mentioning the ways she’d helped the Watchers in the past.

Now, why would the killer target her? I wrestled with this question for a while before a simple solution smacked me in the face. What if she wasn’t really the target? An enchanted coin is just like a poisoned drink: they both kill indiscriminately. What if her death was an accident? Collateral damage from an attack aimed at the real target?

Again, I pondered why a Tyrian sorcerer would go through all this trouble to murder someone and why he was so far from home. Suddenly, all the pieces came together. He wanted to silence his partner, who had a change of heart about their vile business, and he wanted to do it in a way that wouldn’t arouse suspicion before he headed back to the Dominion. But he hadn’t counted on Arlise…

Despite the focus on plot, I made sure not to avoid neglecting character and internal conflict. Both victims share a desire to become better people. To live good lives. The fact they were robbed of that chance deeply resonates with Arlise, as it’s the reason she became a Watcher in the first place. It also troubles her. What if the murderer slips through her fingers? Does failure mean she hasn’t really become a better person? Even though her partner and lover Beren helps allay these fears, they’re she grapples with until the climax of “Lightning Between Your Fingers”.

If you’re interested in “Lightning Between Your Fingers”, you can find it in Broadswords and Blasters Issue #8