Jonathan Moeller's Blog, page 300

a brief excerpt from GHOST IN THE SURGE

Now on Chapter 18 of 27, so let’s have two brief excerpts from GHOST IN THE SURGE:

Sicarion had killed so many people over the centuries. Lords and magistrates, magi and occultists, rich and poor, noble and common, men and women and children from every walk of life.

But he had never killed an Emperor before.

Time to rectify that.

Also this:

“Now,” said Jadriga.

She took a deep breath, her stolen body’s lungs filling with air. After two thousand years, she was ready. Two thousand years of torment, of study, of constant struggle and experimentation and fighting. Two thousand years spent acquiring the most profound knowledge of sorcery and the netherworld ever collected upon this world, knowledge that surpassed the Great Necromancers of Maat, or the Imperial Magisterium during its height in the Fourth Empire.

Knowledge that she could, at last, put to use.

-JM

FROSTBORN: THE EIGHTFOLD KNIFE and FROSTBORN: THE FIRST QUEST now on iTunes!

I’m pleased to report that FROSTBORN: THE EIGHTFOLD KNIFE and FROSTBORN: THE FIRST QUEST are now available on iTunes! Links are below:

THE EIGHTFOLD KNIFE on iTunes.

THE FIRST QUEST on iTunes.

-JM

Reader Question Day #77 – all about the Kindle Fires

This week’s Reader Question Day actually has nothing to do with writing.

MLM asks, concerning Amazon’s Kindle Fire tablets:

Tell me everything you know about Kindle Fires. I’m coveting…

Everything I know? This will take a while!

Basically, there are choices. Four models are available currently:

The 7-inch Kindle Fire HD, at $139 with 8 GB of storage.

The 9-inch Kindle Fire HD, at $229 with 16 GB of storage.

The 7-inch Kindle Fire HDX, at $229, with 16 GB of storage.

The 9-inch Kindle Fire HDX, at $379, with 16 GB of storage.

(Models with higher storage and cellular connectivity are available, but obviously that drives up the price.)

The 7-inch HD Fire has a 1200 x 800 display and no camera.

The 9-inch HD Fire has a 1920 x 1200 display (basically, more pixels so the screen looks prettier and more things fit on it) and a front-facing camera for Skype and such.

The 7-inch Fire HDX has a 1920 x 1200 display, which means it basically packs the same of pixels as the 9-inch Fire HD in a smaller space, so the screen looks very, very good. It also has the front-facing camera for Skype and so forth. It will have a lighter and thinner build than the HD Fires, and a better battery life.

The 9-inch Fire HDX has a 2560 x 1600 display, which is a lot of pixels and one of the best tablet displays currently on the market. It also has front and back cameras, so you can take pictures with it, though I imagine that would be rather awkward. Basically, the nine-inch HDX is the nicest of the lot, but the most expensive by far.

Both the HD and the HDX Fires come with Special Offers – Amazon sets the lock screen to show ads and featured deals on products it thinks you’ll like. Some people find it creepy, but I suspect you would not object. You can pay more for a Fire without Special Offers, but most people don’t.

The HDX Fires have better battery life and are lighter than the HD models, but the HD Fires aren’t particularly heavy and get good battery life.

Both the HDX and the HD have good speakers, and you can use them without headphones in a quiet room. Both make unexpectedly good portable stereo systems.

The HDX Fires also come with a feature called MayDay – you hit the MayDay button, and within seconds an Amazon rep appears for a video chat to solve your problem (assuming your Internet connection is working). I personally think that’s a bit creepy, but I think most people will love the feature. Don’t know if you’ll ever use it.

The content offerings on all the Fire models are very heavily geared towards Amazon – they work well with Kindle, Amazon MP3, and Amazon Instant Video and so forth. There are Netflix and Hulu Plus apps available for the Fires, but the Fire tablets work best with Amazon’s media services. Obviously, you won’t be able to install the Nook app on a Kindle Fire, or anything from Apple.

Speaking off apps, the app selection is somewhat limited for the Kindle Fires. The only source to get new apps is from the Amazon Appstore, not the Google Play store. The selection isn’t terrible, and most (but not all) of the popular ones are in there. However, certain Android apps might be missing, so if there’s an app you absolutely MUST have, it’s good to check to see if it is there first.

Related to that, the Kindle Fires do not have a lot of offline storage. The baseline model, the HD 7-inch, comes with 8 GB of storage, and after the OS and various apps are installed, I believe only 5 GB or so is available for user files, and 10 GB on the HDX 7-inch model. Additionally, the Fires do not offer microSD slots for storage expansion. One HD movie can weigh in at about 6 GB, so if you have a big music or video collection, you’re not going to fit a lot of it on any model of Fire. (I think Amazon prefers that you stream everything anyway.)

Ebooks take up a comparatively small amount of space, so you won’t have to worry about filling it up with ebooks unless you have something like 4,000 books or more in your library.

In the ads Amazon has been touting how you can work with Microsoft Office documents on a Fire HDX, but practically speaking, it’s hard to actually do work on a tablet. You can probably use the Fires to read a long Word document or spreadsheet or something, but if you actually need to sit down and compose a long document or a PowerPoint presentation, you’re going to use your laptop.

So, to sum up, if you want a 7-inch Fire, go with the 7-inch Fire HD on cost, or a 7-inch Fire HDX if you’re willing to spend the extra $100 for a nicer screen. If you want a 9-inch Fire, get the 9-inch Fire HD – I don’t think the 9-inch Fire HDX is sufficiently improved over the 9-inch HD to justify the extra cost.

And that is all I know about the Kindle Fires.

-JM

Thursdays of SWORD & SORCERESS 28 – the Rebecca Eaker interview

As I have done for several years in the past, I will be running interviews with my fellow contributors to Sword & Sorceress 28.

It’s fun to do, and a good chance for the writers to talk about themselves and their work. This week’s interview is with Rebecca Eaker.

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Tell  us about yourself.  

I am so excited that my first fiction publication is with Sword and Sorceress!  My father, Jessie Eaker, has written several stories for S&S.  Growing up, I always watched him write these stories and thought to myself: wouldn’t it be cool to be a writer?

I live in Richmond, VA and I am also a full time teacher.  Teaching is a profession that presents its own sort of unique challenges, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.   I am also currently working on my master’s degree in English, in addition to having recently gotten engaged, so this is a pretty busy and exciting time in my life!

Tell us about your S&S 28 story.

My story is about a little girl who is both deaf and blind.  She feels terribly alone, not really knowing what it means to connect with another human being.   This all changes, however, when she meets Nolia, a Troubadour who plays the music of magic.

Can you share an excerpt from your story?  Here is the first section.

For the girl who lived above the inn, all the world was dark and silent.  She had never glimpsed the sunlight flickering among the trees in evening or heard the staccato song of crickets at nightfall.  But she had been born this way–unable to see, unable to hear–and so darkness, silence meant nothing to her.  For the girl, color was the golden smell of honeysuckle just outside the window and music was the wind that danced across her nose.  

She spent many of her days one and the same, waking and sleeping when she pleased, later exploring her small corner of the world.  With hands extended, she’d prance about the room, feeling rough cracks in the floorboards or soft folds in the bed’s quilt.  Sometimes her mother put lilies on the dresser and the girl held the flowers to her nose, tracing the papery leaves and silken petals with her fingers, tasting the fragrance in the air.  Other times, she was content to wallow in the scents that drifted up from the inn below–meat and ale, grease and spice–and to feel the human rumblings that reached through walls and ceilings.  But most of all things, she loved to stand by the window, feeling wind or rain or warm sunlight pass by, each like an old friend, each whispering of a world beyond the reach of her grasping fingers.

She lived her life, for the most part, alone.  There was her mother of course, who sometimes came, bringing turmoil into her peaceful world.  Once the girl had wanted to understand her.  But now, grown older, more independent, the girl considered her little more than a force like the wind, one that came and went but never stayed.  Her visits, after all, were never very pleasant.  Sometimes she brought something rough and wet to wipe the girl’s face, and dumped water on her head until her hair ran down her back like streams of rain.  And then she’d take her clothes and leave her with new ones that were still and chill and smelled of strong soap.  Sometimes her mother brought food, but when the girl smeared crumbs and honey between her fingers, reveling in the sticky mess, her mother slapped her hands away and came at her with the rough, wet cloth again.  The girl was just as happy to be left by herself.   

 

But sometimes, as she stood at the window, breeze tickling her face, a strange feeling filled her, overpowering her so that she laid her head on the window sill.  Water ran from her eyes.  The wind, though gentle, understood her no more than her mother.  And though she didn’t have a word to name it, the girl understood what it was to be alone.

Would you say fantasy needs to reflect real life, or offer an escape from it?

I would say good fantasy offers a bit of both.  I am a strong believer in the idea that characters are what drive a story.  And characters, I think, no matter if they are in the “real” world or a fantasy world, offer some insight into the human experience.  The world itself can offer an escape but it is the characters who take you there.

What are your preferred tools and environment for writing?  (typewriter, computer, pen, coffee shop, and so on)

When I am writing a story, I absolutely have to type it.  Hand writing anything drives me crazy!   In particular, I have only this year discovered that a shiny new MacBook Pro makes writing infinitely more enjoyable.   (Alas, it also provides great distraction….)  I love writing anywhere that’s quiet and especially late at night.  A cold cherry Coke Zero is a must have addition to any good writing session.

How many drafts of a story or a novel do you typically write?

I definitely consider myself a “multi-drafter.”  By the time I finish the first draft of a story, I already know at least twelve different ways it needs to be revised.  Often, I continuously revise as I write, so it’s hard to say just how many drafts I write.  Any way you look at it, it’s definitely more than one.

Have you tried any self-publishing projects yourself?

I have not tried any self-publishing… but it something that fascinates me!  I love that our modern age allows for voices everywhere to be heard in all different forms.

If offering advice to a new writer, would you suggest they pursue traditional publication or self-publication?

There’s something very rewarding about having something published the “traditional” way.  To new writers with this goal I would say: be persistent.  Speaking from experience, this is my first publication and it was rejected at least four times before it found a home in Sword and Sorceress.  However, that said, if you’ve tried traditional publication and it’s not working out, I see nothing wrong with self-publication.  I think it’s a great alternative!

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Thanks, Rebecca, for the interview.

Check out our interviews with past S&S contributors – , , , Sword & Sorceress 25, Sword & Sorceress 26, andSword & Sorceress 27.

And the novel featuring my Sword & Sorceress character, spy and assassin Caina Amalas, is now available for free in all ebook formats: Child of the Ghosts.

FROSTBORN updates

All three FROSTBORN books are currently in the Top 20 for Historical Fantasy on Amazon UK. Thanks, everyone!

Amazingly, FROSTBORN: THE FIRST QUEST is still #1 for Arthurian Fantasy on Amazon UK. I’m not sure why. Though I certainly shall not complain! 

-JM

a brief excerpt from GHOST IN THE SURGE

Let us have a brief excerpt from GHOST IN THE SURGE:

Kylon had loved his sister, had been in awe of her sorcerous prowess and her political skill, but as he stood upon the prow of his ship and looked at the capital of the Empire, he realized that Andromache had been a fool.

There was no way New Kyre could ever have conquered the Empire, even if Andromache had become the most powerful sorceress in the world. New Kyre was but one city with a fleet. Malarae was just one of the Empire’s great cities. The Empire was too large, too wealthy, too populous. The Kyracians could defeat the Empire at sea, but they could never hope to conquer the Empire of Nighmar.

The best New Kyre could hope was to stand free of the Empire’s might, to use its fleets and wealth to make the city far too difficult a target.

And as Imperial warships came to escort his squadron into the harbor, Kylon hoped he could do that.

Reader Question Day #76 – Are THE GHOSTS books appropriate for teens?

Someone asked over Twitter  whether or not THE GHOSTS books would be appropriate for teenagers.

The answer, of course, is that it depends on the teenager.

That said, when people ask “is this book appropriate for my teenager?”, they are in fact generally asking three separate questions. 1.) Does this book have explicit sex? 2.) Does this book have explicit violence? 3.) Is this book thematically appropriate for a teenager? (That is, does the book end with a 20-page manifesto celebrating suicide as a means of solving one’s difficulties, or that sweaty men with candy and windowless vans are fonts of wisdom, or some other time bomb of a message that a parent doesn’t particularly want poured into the brain of his or her child.)

So, first, 1.) sex. There’s no explicit sex in THE GHOSTS, and to be honest, not all that much sex of any kind. In fact, if I remember correctly, there’s no sex at all in GHOST IN THE FLAMES and GHOST IN THE STONE. What is in there is not explicit, and I generally move over it with a sentence. In fact, I once had an Amazon review that dinged a star because the sexual encounters “always fade to black”, which I took as a point of pride.

Then 2.), violence. There is quite a lot of fighting in THE GHOSTS books, some of it explicit. In most of the books, the fighting is generally spies fighting with daggers, knives, and swords, though in GHOST IN THE STORM, most of the book takes place in a city that is falling to an invading army, so there are some big battles in it. So lots of medieval/ancient style fighting – think THE LORD OF THE RINGS-style PG-13 violence. Basically, if you see THE HOBBIT next month, THE GHOSTS books have about that level of violence.

Finally, 3.) themes of the books. Generally, I don’t try to write books with big Messages – like how HUNGER GAMES is obviously about reality TV and child soldiers. For the most part, I try simply to write the best adventure I can. Some themes do creep in from time to time. One reviewer pointed out that Caina seems to spend a great deal of time fighting slave traders. Alas, slavery is one of those evils that seems chronic to the human condition – nowadays we just call them human traffickers. And the magi in THE GHOSTS do owe quite a bit to the National Institute of Coordinated Experimentation in CS Lewis’s THAT HIDEOUS STRENGTH – several of the villains in THE GHOSTS have quite a bit in common with Professor Weston.

But generally I try to write a fun and captivating read – any Messages are incidental.

-JM

FROSTBORN: THE EIGHTFOLD KNIFE first week.

178 copies! Thanks, everyone!

-JM

Thursdays of SWORD & SORCERESS 28 – the Lorie Calkins interview

As I have done for several years in the past, I will be running interviews with my fellow contributors to Sword & Sorceress 28.

It’s fun to do, and a good chance for the writers to talk about themselves and their work. This week’s interview is with Lorie Calkins.

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Tell us about yourself.

I’m a super-shy writer, mother of four great kids, and grandma of six. I also have a wonderful husband, no cats at all, and far too many hobbies. My first submitted story was to a Wyoming fiction contest in 1982. Amazingly, shockingly, astoundingly, it didn’t win. But somehow, I didn’t stop writing.

Tell us about your S&S 28 story.

I set out to write something funny and short that didn’t fit the mold, wasn’t cute or sweet or endearing. I don’t know how well I succeeded in that, but I like Ru, and I think she’s going to find trouble to get into everywhere she goes. She’s also going to make friends, and she’ll hate that.

Can you share an excerpt from your story?

Ru clawed at the cliff edge with her hands, scrabbled at the crumbling dirt below it with her toes, and came to a halt. A slow slide, really. She glared at the sprays of colored flowers sticking through her fingers, as if they were the enemy, and not the only thing keeping her from certain death. A toe’s niche in soft dirt, and the stubborn roots of two handfuls of wildflowers and sea grass were all that held her.

Above, on solid ground, the dragon peered down at her. She couldn’t let go of the weeds to pull her sword, and she didn’t have the leverage to fight from here anyway. The thing was going to toast her and eat her, if she didn’t fall the rest of the way and drown or splatter. Well, things were looking up. This was not so boring.

Would you say fantasy needs to reflect real life, or offer an escape from it?

I think fiction – any fiction – is a vacation. There are working vacations, family visit vacations, exotic show-off vacations, adventure vacations to test your courage or strength or stamina, or just pump up your adrenaline. And there are decadent vacations that let you bask in the sun and “consume vast quantities.” We use fiction the same way, to test our wits or bravery, get a thrill, show off our good taste or intellect, and just take a break from our daily lives. A good story has to reflect real personalities, situations, and needs that hint at the reader’s own, at the same time cloaking those elements in a scenario that draws readers out of their world and into the ether of the imaginary. So I would have to say that for this reader, fantasy should be both an escape and a reflection of real life. If it isn’t, I might as well stay home.

What are your preferred tools and environment for writing? (Typewriter, computer, pen, coffee shop, and so on.)

I typically write the first draft with cheap ballpoint pen in a spiral notebook or legal pad, then clean it up and fill it out as I type it into the computer. And I often have trouble figuring out what that squiggle was supposed to be, or what I meant when I scrawled that note to, “Put a fish here, Lor.” A fish?

How many drafts of a story or novel do you typically write?

Two.

Have you tried any self-publishing projects yourself?

Nope. Chicken. And a terrible salesperson.

If offering advice to a new writer, would you suggest they pursue traditional publication or self-publication?

I would tell them, “Bah. Go to school. Learn something useful.” Or I would say, “Run away. The writing world is infested with crooks, poseurs and well-meaning people who can’t follow through.” Or maybe, “Here’s a hammer. Hit yourself with it repeatedly, and it will feel the same as the road to getting published.” If they are determined to self-immolate, I would tell them to try the traditional route first, because it’s a good way to find out if the work is really ready for publication. {I fear this sounds just a tad cynical, and will insult the many wonderful people in the writing world who have helped me, and others, for no good reason but to be nice. Good people are out there, but one can’t get far without losing a couple of shirts and getting covered in slime.}

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Thanks, Michael, for the interview.

Check out our interviews with past S&S contributors – , , , Sword & Sorceress 25, Sword & Sorceress 26, andSword & Sorceress 27.

And the novel featuring my Sword & Sorceress character, spy and assassin Caina Amalas, is now available for free in all ebook formats: Child of the Ghosts.

a milestones post

Some exciting milestones in October.

FROSTBORN: THE GRAY KNIGHT sold its 1,000th copy in October, in two in a half months. Of course, GHOST IN THE MASK sold its 1,300th copy in October, managing that feat in a mere six weeks. (Sorry, Ridmark Arban – I suppose Caina Amalas is simply more charming.)

And A KNIGHT OF THE SACRED BLADE (the second book of THE TOWER OF ENDLESS WORLDS series) sold its 1,000th copy in October, and that took seventeen months. But it was a particularly satisfying milestone. I wrote the entire THE TOWER OF ENDLESS WORLDS series in 2003 (more on that here), and the books sat unread and forgotten in my hard drive for years.

So it’s good to know that I didn’t waste 2003.

-JM