Moe Lane's Blog, page 493
September 20, 2022
Looking for future book fairs and conventions.
Starting in December – or, more likely, January 2023. Maryland for preference, although if I can get to somewhere in DC or Northern Virginia without putting my life in my hands that’s fine. I would actually prefer the smaller venues at this point, because they’re more likely to be reasonable on table fees. The last two biggish conventions I vended at… were not.
Suggestions welcome.
Schedule:
October 1st: Fright Reads.November 19th: Stellar Con.
The ‘This Doesn’t Look Half Bad’ THE MIDNIGHT CLUB Netflix trailer.
I mean, THE MIDNIGHT CLUB’S got a definite vibe going. It’s always exciting when the ostensible Plucky Heroine says something like If there’s a way to save us, I’d burn the world down in a horror show. It promises that entertainingly horrific Bad Decisions are going to be made, very, very soon.
Netflix, October 7th. I may actually catch this.
09/20/2022 Snippet, BUZZ ON THE STREETS.
More conversations!
Patreon!“So we look out the window, and it ain’t the trash guys. It’s, like, five guys fighting, four on one, and the one’s winning. Knocked them all flat, too. The last one standing, your elf smacked into my window, so hard it cracked.”
The shopkeeper shrugged, and started sweeping again. After a minute I waved my hands around and said, “And?”
“And what?”
“What happened then?”
“Nothing? Your buddy threw them all in a coach, and left.”
“Hold up. There was a coach? With horses?”
“Yeah, Shamus. What did you think they did, run up on foot?”
“I wasn’t here, buddy. You were. So, they had a coach. Was it fancy?”
“It had a coat of arms on it, so yeah. Got dinged up in the fight, though. The guy inside it was yelling a lot when your buddy started throwing the goons inside.”
“So there were five guys, then?”
“No, six.”
Geez, how many people were at this fight, anyway? “Really? Who was the sixth guy? The coach driver?”
The shopkeeper looked at me like I was nuts. “No, the driver was with the four guys fighting your buddy, Shamus. Your buddy was the fifth guy. The guy in the coach, he was the sixth guy.”
“Ah. Gotcha.”
“Didn’t anybody ever teach you to count, Shamus?”
“Only my blessings,” I mumbled.
Tweet of the Day, I Want To *Watch* Somebody Drink Some Of These edition.
Because I have no intention of ever actually drinking any of them myself. Oh, my, no. Let somebody else suffer, in the name of art…
i've preemptively named every mountain dew-based cocktail. please note I've only made like 3 of these combinations pic.twitter.com/GbaGQ8novD
— Jack Grimes (@Jackapedia_) September 19, 2022
Via @TychoBrahe.
The Dr. Grordbort’s Scientific Adventure Violence (5e D&D) Kickstarter.
Dr. Grordbort’s Scientific Adventure Violence looks like a lot of fun, it’s a cool concept, and I can confirm that it’s ethically sourced (they’re printing it in Lithuania). Retro-raygun and mad science roleplaying in a pulpy Solar System. Neat!
The Kickstarter’s only got 48 hours left, so if you’re going to get it, get it now.
September 19, 2022
There will be one more ‘By Eric Flint’ 163X book.
Which is… well, ‘nice’ isn’t the right word. But at least it’ll be one last book of Eric’s.
September 2023
1638: The Siberian Enterprise by Eric Flint, Paula Goodlett & Gorg Huff—hardcover
There’s some more under-contract books that will be deemed ‘With Eric Flint,’ and anything more than that will depend on getting permission from Eric Flint’s widow and heir Lucille Robbins. It sounds like they do want to keep the series running, at least for a while. Hopefully there won’t be too much disruption of the existing Ring of Fire community. Hopefully.
Item Seed: The Lancaster Grimoire.
I was going to go all spooky horror, but this is maybe more interesting. And maybe more subtly unsettling, in its way. I mean, what if the kid only smiles over the oddest things?
Lancaster-Grimoire-Google-DocsDownload09/19/22 Snippet, BUZZ ON THE STREETS.
Conversations!
Patreon!The local landscape showed signs of what is usually delicately called a ‘disturbance:’ broken crates, scattered garbage from an overturned can, and one shop window sporting a spiderweb of cracks. That looked like it was going to be expensive to fix.
A skinny old guy half-filled the way in front of the window, grumpily sweeping up spilled sawdust and wood splinters from all the crates. From the way he kept smacking the sidewalk with his broom, he blamed it for his half-busted window. “Morning, Senor,” I said, tipping my hat. “You have a busy night?”
“What’s it to you?” the guy replied — and then he took a look at the Shamus suit, tie, and hat. “Oh, morning, Shamus. What’s it to you?” he said again, only this time with a bit more enthusiasm. “You on a case?”
“Geez, I hope not,” I replied, and his face fell slightly. It brightened up again when I went on, “But I’m looking for somebody, might have come through here last night. Guy by the name of Lucas? About so high, dark skin, curly hair, looks like he moonlights as a really good evil companion?”
“Depends. That elf a friend of yours?”
I carefully didn’t grin. “I’m asking about him, ain’t I?” I sighed, and handed him my card. “Look, lemme just cut to the chase. Give that to whoever you got fixing the window, and tell ‘em to send me the bill. I’ll make it go away.” Well, Sofie would. She said she’d be nice about expenses, and the cynical part of me was sure this would all end up being her fault anyway.
I had Thoughts about AI Art.
On Twitter.
I was morbidly curious enough to look up what Kate was talking about (https://t.co/C6aNZySlhB). My reaction? The cover may or may not have hurt an artist, but it probably hurt the writer. https://t.co/B6YSCoCTiF
— Ogiel (Moe Lane) (@Ogiel23) September 19, 2022
Short version: somebody used an AI-generated picture for the cover of their free RPG supplement, which is… fine, it’s their life. Then they decided to turn everything up to 11, because Twitter. My own opinion is AI-generated art won’t generate me sales, so I won’t use it. Using human artists does, so I do.
Well, that’s one of my opinions. Some of the other ones are a little too unkind to state too clearly. I wasn’t actually looking to start fights today: I know, I know, how the mighty have fallen…
