Logan Albright's Blog, page 2
November 18, 2019
Our Servants, Our Masters
Hello Goodreads!
I just wanted to let everybody know that my new book, "Our Servants, Our Masters: How Control Masquerades as Assistance" is now available.
For those of you have have read my fiction before, this is something a little different. It's a non-fiction book about hierarchies and language. Like George Orwell, I believe that the language we use shapes the way we think, and can have profound consequences for society. In this book, I examine the term "public servant" and try to uncover what people really mean when they use that phrase. In many cases, the institutions we think of as serving us actually spend much more time trying to control us.
If you've enjoyed my previous writing, I urge you to check out "Our Servants, our Masters". It may not be fiction, but it contains a healthy dose of personal philosophy that informs much of what I write in general.
The book can be found here, and is available in both paperback and e-book formats on Amazon.com:
I just wanted to let everybody know that my new book, "Our Servants, Our Masters: How Control Masquerades as Assistance" is now available.
For those of you have have read my fiction before, this is something a little different. It's a non-fiction book about hierarchies and language. Like George Orwell, I believe that the language we use shapes the way we think, and can have profound consequences for society. In this book, I examine the term "public servant" and try to uncover what people really mean when they use that phrase. In many cases, the institutions we think of as serving us actually spend much more time trying to control us.
If you've enjoyed my previous writing, I urge you to check out "Our Servants, our Masters". It may not be fiction, but it contains a healthy dose of personal philosophy that informs much of what I write in general.
The book can be found here, and is available in both paperback and e-book formats on Amazon.com:
September 23, 2014
Small Craft: A Novel
After many long months, my latest novel, Small Craft is finally available in both paperback and e-book formats.
Here is the description from the back cover:
"A lightning flash, a suicide leap, and a relocation for a new job. Three random events that would change the course of three men's lives forever. Is it fate, or divine intervention, or just plain old-fashioned luck? Do we control our own destinies, or are we just pawns in some larger game? For sailor Rake McMillan, librarian Humphrey Alsatia, and Salesman Jason Bidwell, the answers to these questions could spell the difference between life and death."
Paperback: http://smile.amazon.com/Small-Craft-N...
E-Book: http://smile.amazon.com/Small-Craft-L...
Here is the description from the back cover:
"A lightning flash, a suicide leap, and a relocation for a new job. Three random events that would change the course of three men's lives forever. Is it fate, or divine intervention, or just plain old-fashioned luck? Do we control our own destinies, or are we just pawns in some larger game? For sailor Rake McMillan, librarian Humphrey Alsatia, and Salesman Jason Bidwell, the answers to these questions could spell the difference between life and death."
Paperback: http://smile.amazon.com/Small-Craft-N...
E-Book: http://smile.amazon.com/Small-Craft-L...
January 9, 2014
The Light Fantastic Now Available
After many months, I am pleased to announce that my latest novel, The Light Fantastic: Being a Factual History of the Swatsworth Gaslight Company, is now available in paperback and Kindle versions at low, low prices.
Please purchase and review it here.
The Light Fantastic: Being a Factual History of the Swatshworth Gaslight Company
Please purchase and review it here.
The Light Fantastic: Being a Factual History of the Swatshworth Gaslight Company
October 28, 2013
The Light Fantastic
my most recent novel, The Light Fantastic: Being a Factual History of the Swatsworth Gaslight Company. A little proofreading, formatting and cover design to go and then it will be made available for reading. It couldn't come sooner, because National Novel Writing Month is less than a week away!
August 9, 2013
Perspectives on Pandemonium
I thought I would use this blog to reflect a bit on some of my previous books, to give people a better idea of what I was thinking when I wrote them.
Pandemonium was obviously my first completed novel and the longest thing I had ever written up to that point. It was primarily an exercise to see if I could do it, and I am pleased with the result, although I think I've improved a lot as a writer since then.
I took my inspiration from Paradise Lost, which I believe to be the best poem in the English language. Like Philip Pullman (author of the His Dark Materials Trilogy, which is also based on Paradise Lost) I firmly believe that Milton was in the Devil's camp without realizing it.
Lucifer's assertions that the mind can transform a hell into a heaven and that it is preferable to live free in an unpleasant environment than to be a bird in a gilded cage resonate strongly with my personal philosophy, and saw this book as an opportunity to highlight that aspect of the story.
This is also when I learned the immense benefit of outlining. Having a predetermined structure based on the poem was a huge help. Paradise Lost has 12 parts, and so does Pandemonium, in relatively close correspondence. I had attempted a novel some years earlier with no outline, and I quickly got lost in my own narrative. Writing towards something you know has to happen makes life so much easier.
The novel shows the clear influence of dystopia novels like 1984, Fahrenheit 451, and Ayn Rand's Anthem, with a space opera setting. The setting required that I write fight scenes as well, which I had never done before, and which turned out to be surprisingly difficult. Action is much harder to convey in words than it is visually, but I think I did an okay job.
Despite its flaws, Pandemonium still contains one of my favorite things I've ever written: the scene in which the two humans awake for the first time in the analog to the Garden of Eden. I had a great time imagining the world through the eyes of a conscious being with no experiences to draw from whatsoever. It's a little like that scene in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy where the whale is suddenly created in mid air and has time to comment on its surroundings before plummeting to its death.
I like science fiction, but frankly am not enough of a scientist to live up to modern standards of hard sci-fi, so I don't know if I'll be revisiting the genre anytime soon. You can't get away with writing like Edgar Rice Burroughs these days. In any case, I get bored if I stay in the same genre too long. I have never understood how some authors can spend their entire career writing - for example - Westerns without running out of things to say, but I guess the kind of royalties those guys get is a good motivator.
Pandemonium was obviously my first completed novel and the longest thing I had ever written up to that point. It was primarily an exercise to see if I could do it, and I am pleased with the result, although I think I've improved a lot as a writer since then.
I took my inspiration from Paradise Lost, which I believe to be the best poem in the English language. Like Philip Pullman (author of the His Dark Materials Trilogy, which is also based on Paradise Lost) I firmly believe that Milton was in the Devil's camp without realizing it.
Lucifer's assertions that the mind can transform a hell into a heaven and that it is preferable to live free in an unpleasant environment than to be a bird in a gilded cage resonate strongly with my personal philosophy, and saw this book as an opportunity to highlight that aspect of the story.
This is also when I learned the immense benefit of outlining. Having a predetermined structure based on the poem was a huge help. Paradise Lost has 12 parts, and so does Pandemonium, in relatively close correspondence. I had attempted a novel some years earlier with no outline, and I quickly got lost in my own narrative. Writing towards something you know has to happen makes life so much easier.
The novel shows the clear influence of dystopia novels like 1984, Fahrenheit 451, and Ayn Rand's Anthem, with a space opera setting. The setting required that I write fight scenes as well, which I had never done before, and which turned out to be surprisingly difficult. Action is much harder to convey in words than it is visually, but I think I did an okay job.
Despite its flaws, Pandemonium still contains one of my favorite things I've ever written: the scene in which the two humans awake for the first time in the analog to the Garden of Eden. I had a great time imagining the world through the eyes of a conscious being with no experiences to draw from whatsoever. It's a little like that scene in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy where the whale is suddenly created in mid air and has time to comment on its surroundings before plummeting to its death.
I like science fiction, but frankly am not enough of a scientist to live up to modern standards of hard sci-fi, so I don't know if I'll be revisiting the genre anytime soon. You can't get away with writing like Edgar Rice Burroughs these days. In any case, I get bored if I stay in the same genre too long. I have never understood how some authors can spend their entire career writing - for example - Westerns without running out of things to say, but I guess the kind of royalties those guys get is a good motivator.
August 1, 2013
New Novel on the Way!
Hi everyone! I'm starting a blog to talk about my work and any forthcoming projects I undertake.
I've spent the last eight months working on my newest novel, a story of two friends who found a business together, grow rich, and ultimately drift apart with time. It's fundamentally a story of how time changes people and how hard it is to maintain a relationship, even a platonic one, as baggage accumulates and personalities clash.
This is my most ambitious work to date, being more than twice as long as anything I've yet written, and I'm very excited to see how it turns out. I've got six chapters left to write, after which there will have to be a bit of editing. I don't have an idea of the release date yet, but you should be able to expect it sometime within the next month or two.
In the meantime, you should enjoy reading and reviewing my previous books, about which I'll be talking more soon.
Thanks for reading!
I've spent the last eight months working on my newest novel, a story of two friends who found a business together, grow rich, and ultimately drift apart with time. It's fundamentally a story of how time changes people and how hard it is to maintain a relationship, even a platonic one, as baggage accumulates and personalities clash.
This is my most ambitious work to date, being more than twice as long as anything I've yet written, and I'm very excited to see how it turns out. I've got six chapters left to write, after which there will have to be a bit of editing. I don't have an idea of the release date yet, but you should be able to expect it sometime within the next month or two.
In the meantime, you should enjoy reading and reviewing my previous books, about which I'll be talking more soon.
Thanks for reading!
