Moe Lane's Blog, page 58

‘Taps.’

Thank you.

Wheel of Time series canceled at Amazon. …Is that bad, or good?

I’ve never seen the series, and haven’t read the books. So I don’t know whether fans of the latter are screaming to the heavens, or breathing sighs of relief. The way the studios do things around here, it could be either, really.

…I wonder when Amazon is gonna give up on Rings of Power? I mean, I have. And that honestly should be a sign.

Reminder: Review the books you read!

I’m not gonna do the polite thing that I normally do and not make it about me, either. Absolutely, rank and review my books. Do it for other people, sure, but I hunger for help from the algorithm just like any other author would. Especially on months where my online sales are drastically lagging my offline ones, and I don’t even understand why that happens. But it does! It’s like there’s this Law of Conservation of Sales, and it is bemusing to no end.

#commissionearned

05/26/2025 Snippet, CALL OF THE MOON-BEASTS.

Hey! We’re getting close!

…

The room on the other side was strange. It was just a room, to start with. Easily big enough to fit everybody, but there were no other doors. There was a recessed alcove on the far side, but it was blank, without even a carving or picture to relieve the blankness of the lunar stone walls. The lighting was odd, too: there were four braziers set against each wall, each pulsing with a flickering light. The light looked like fire — deep down, a long-dormant part of Tobias’s soul was screaming at the threat of open flame on the Moon — but it couldn’t be, obviously. There was no heat, and no actual flames. It was just a clearly-artificial radiance that pulsed in a way that looked like firelight.

Tobias kept telling himself that until he believed it.

There were six tables in the room, made of more of that impossible wood, and each one was heaped with things. Three of the tables held metal bars and disks, with heaps of crystals of every possible hue. Two of the tables were loaded down with scrolls and intricate collections of brass and glass, contorted in shapes that seemed to contort and writhe in the flickering light of the braziers. And the sixth… Tobias deliberately focused on the other five.

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The ‘Please don’t make this’ PHILLY JUSTICE trailer.

I ask only because the Parks & Recreation folks making the trailer, and apparently the pilot, because of their elaborate, ongoing, behind-the-scenes extended joke is itself funny. Actually green-lighting PHILLY JUSTICE itself would be a terrible, terrible mistake. It’s perfect as it is.

I will concede that Ron Swanson would make for an epic judge, though.

#commissionearned

05/26/2025 Snippet, TOM VARGAS AND THE CASE OF THE MEDDLING PRIEST.

The system seems to be working!

…

Ever try to catch a six-foot unconscious orc? I bet it’s real funny to watch. Actually doing it feels like getting smothered by a sack of rocks.

I cheated, sorta. A really nice guy would have fireman-carried Mike over to a couch, or something. Me, I settled for taking the guy’s weight long enough to let him sprawl on the floor without cracking his head on it. I even managed to find a spot without too much crap on it already; I grabbed something that looked soft, and shoved it under his head for a pillow. Orcs were supposed to be tough, right? He probably slept the floor normally. Besides, there wasn’t even a couch anyway.

My tender ministrations finished, I started checking the room. It was scrambled up, thanks to the demon — but it was also a lot easier to breathe in, thanks to the demon being gone, and that made up for the mess. I wasn’t really looking for clues, anyway. That’s not what I do, really.

‘Whole Lotta Love.’

Whole Lotta Love, Led Zeppelin

#commissionearned

05/25/2025 Snippet, CALL OF THE MOON-BEASTS.

I’m trying something that may force me to finish this stuff in a faster manner. Hope it works!

There wasn’t a ladder underneath the hatch, only a rope leading to the floor below. That turned out to be fine for everybody, including the two civilians — or three, Tobias thought. Although Lily knows spelunking. He still worried about how they’d get up quickly, though. The floor was eight feet below them, which a person could leap in a hurry, if they needed to. And if they didn’t panic, which again might be a problem for the two civilians. Everybody left alive on the Moon may have been tough-headed enough to survive for this long, but you never knew what a person’s breaking strain was until they hit it.

The smell down here was more of a stink, or maybe a medley. There were all sorts of odors, from stagnant water to something that almost smelled like flowers.

There was also a underlying aroma, all burnt and greasy, that kept assaulting Tobias’s nostrils, and he wasn’t sure which meaning of ‘assault’ was the right one. It should have been enticing, but there was something about it that made him feel hungry and revolted at the same time. “Mask up, people,” he said aloud, and felt a queasy fear for a moment that the filters might not work.

Tweet of the Day, Using AI In Your Books Makes You Dumb edition.

I said what I said.

As a warning to rapid-release authors who forgo editors…

This is your future. Save your career. Hire an editor pic.twitter.com/KAPUg06drM

— Kristin | Fictional Influence (@Kristin_Fiction) May 25, 2025

Via @RocketPulpHack.

05/25/2025 Snippet, TOM VARGAS AND THE CASE OF THE MEDDLING PRIEST.

Gotta get this finished.

As a foulness shall ye know them. There’s everything in the Lore, honestly. Including the stuff you wish there wasn’t.

The demon didn’t waste any time coming together, pulling darkness out of every corner of the room. Papers whirled all around us as a foul wind rose up, forcing the taste of brimstone in my mouth. The air reeked of that, and filth both old, and new. A plant set in the window puffed into gray dust as I watched, and I reflexively turned away before I could breathe any of it in.

Meanwhile, in the center of the now-howling room, a figure spawned. It was somehow slimy and sharp-edged at the same time, a writhing mass of black-green corruption congealing into the rough shape of a man. It wasn’t large. Yet. But it wouldn’t be for lack of trying.

Speaking of trying… I took aim with my gun, and turned what looked like the demon’s chest into greasy black foam. Oh, it did not like that! It didn’t like my next three shots, one in the head, and two more in the chest. It didn’t like it, but it didn’t dissipate. That was bad. Four shots was more than enough to keep a regular demon from incarnating, and one more shot than what I should usually try to get off. It’s not easy for me to push around demons. It ain’t my skill set. This could end up being pretty damned painful for me.

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