Loren W. Cooper's Blog
July 13, 2018
Endeavor Award
The Endeavor Award is an award for speculative fiction written by Northwest authors (US and Canada). It's named for H.M. Bark Endeavour, the ship of Northwest explorer Capt. James Cook. It was first presented in 1999 at OryCon, and is presented every year. CrossTown was just selected as one of five Finalists for the 2018 Endeavor Award. The winner will be announced in November at OryCon.
March 20, 2018
WISCON
I will be at WISCON over Memorial Day. Looking forward to delivering a paper on the Academic Track, reading, and panels. I will also be signing in LA at the LA Times Book Festival at the Authorsden Booth April 22nd.
February 21, 2018
Midwest Book Review, February 2018, Fantasy/SF Bookshelf
CrossTown
Loren W. Cooper
Red Hen Press
PO Box 3537, Granada Hills, CA 91394
www.redhen.org
9781939096029, $16.95, PB, 340pp, www.amazon.com
Zethus is a sorcerer and self-described spiritual thug for hire. He makes his living in CrossTown, a place where the many world hypothesis of modern physics manifests itself, where possibilities and probabilities overlap. Caught up in a web of intrigue as he investigates the death of his master, Corvinus, and pursued by agents that want to erase all knowledge of Corvinus's work, Zethus discovers that the key to his master's murder lies in the last project he had pursued before his death. The roots of this project lie deep in the past, at the origin of CrossTown's fractured reality. Once he understands the stakes, Zethus must make the dangerous journey to the cradle of history. The price he must pay to find the answers he seeks will threaten everything he holds dear -- including his own humanity. An impressively original and deftly scripted novel by an author with a genuine flair for imaginative and narrative driven storytelling, "CrossTown" is an expressly and unreservedly recommended as an addition to community library Science Fiction & Fantasy collections, and a 'must' for the personal reading lists of all dedicated fantasy/mystery fans.
Loren W. Cooper
Red Hen Press
PO Box 3537, Granada Hills, CA 91394
www.redhen.org
9781939096029, $16.95, PB, 340pp, www.amazon.com
Zethus is a sorcerer and self-described spiritual thug for hire. He makes his living in CrossTown, a place where the many world hypothesis of modern physics manifests itself, where possibilities and probabilities overlap. Caught up in a web of intrigue as he investigates the death of his master, Corvinus, and pursued by agents that want to erase all knowledge of Corvinus's work, Zethus discovers that the key to his master's murder lies in the last project he had pursued before his death. The roots of this project lie deep in the past, at the origin of CrossTown's fractured reality. Once he understands the stakes, Zethus must make the dangerous journey to the cradle of history. The price he must pay to find the answers he seeks will threaten everything he holds dear -- including his own humanity. An impressively original and deftly scripted novel by an author with a genuine flair for imaginative and narrative driven storytelling, "CrossTown" is an expressly and unreservedly recommended as an addition to community library Science Fiction & Fantasy collections, and a 'must' for the personal reading lists of all dedicated fantasy/mystery fans.
January 26, 2018
Upcoming Guest Blog
Kirby Larson (now up for the Edgar in the Juvenile category and former Newberry Silver Medalist) will be hosting me on her Blog February 2nd. Appreciate Kirby giving fellow authors much visibility. Kirby is a talented writer and a has a good heart, a much more valuable and underappreciated quality.
Oh yeah, and this week I heard that CrossTown was nominated for the Nebula! Good visibility for the book--let's hope it makes it to shortlisting. It's listed on the SFWA Recommended Reading List as well.
Thanks to all of you who have taken the time to read and review--much appreciated!
Oh yeah, and this week I heard that CrossTown was nominated for the Nebula! Good visibility for the book--let's hope it makes it to shortlisting. It's listed on the SFWA Recommended Reading List as well.
Thanks to all of you who have taken the time to read and review--much appreciated!
November 11, 2017
Impressions from the World Fantasy Convention in San Antonio
Terry Brooks read from Running With The Demon, one of my favorites of his and, as it turns out, his favorite. According to Terry, it never sold very well. Somehow that fails to surprise, in this twisted market dynamic no one effectively predicts but which holds every commercial artist at its mercy.
Tananarive Due horror story from her ghost summer collection. Parenting with a twist.
Joe Haldeman's reading was from a draft of a novella he's working on (working title "Protective Coloration.) Looking forward to its release. Premise: interplanetary gov't assassin who happens to be "grandmotherly" in appearance and who believes the best weapon is a sharp and sociopathic mind in a suspicion-defeating package.
Listened to Greg Bear reading a ghost story at the world fantasy convention, and talking later about hauntings he has known. Very cool.
Tananarive Due horror story from her ghost summer collection. Parenting with a twist.
Joe Haldeman's reading was from a draft of a novella he's working on (working title "Protective Coloration.) Looking forward to its release. Premise: interplanetary gov't assassin who happens to be "grandmotherly" in appearance and who believes the best weapon is a sharp and sociopathic mind in a suspicion-defeating package.
Listened to Greg Bear reading a ghost story at the world fantasy convention, and talking later about hauntings he has known. Very cool.
New Book Review
Reviewed by Pam LaCroix 10/24/2017
CrossTown itself isn’t just the setting of this action-packed novel. It’s almost a character that grows, warps and folds on itself physically and temporally. One of the neighborhoods is described as designed by “the architect Escher.” I couldn’t stop mental images of hands drawing themselves and stairways appearing to ascend and descend at the same time. With its diverse population of sinister, mythical characters it seems a universe that parallels Wyoming’s Hole-in-the Wall of the late 1800’s.
Zethus, the primary character, is a powerful sorcerer whose ruthless morality continues to surprise. As he travels through this fictional world he encounters beings even more threatening and dangerous than his CrossTown neighbors. He navigates the physical and temporal pitfalls of his quest with equal parts cunning and thoughtlessness. How he evolves as he delves deeper and deeper into the mystery is every bit as important as the solution to the mystery.
Cooper proves himself a capable manipulator of possibility, probability and reality. The story is fast-moving, exciting and thought-provoking. I happily recommend CrossTown to all lovers of time travel, fantasy, science fiction and alternate reality.
CrossTown itself isn’t just the setting of this action-packed novel. It’s almost a character that grows, warps and folds on itself physically and temporally. One of the neighborhoods is described as designed by “the architect Escher.” I couldn’t stop mental images of hands drawing themselves and stairways appearing to ascend and descend at the same time. With its diverse population of sinister, mythical characters it seems a universe that parallels Wyoming’s Hole-in-the Wall of the late 1800’s.
Zethus, the primary character, is a powerful sorcerer whose ruthless morality continues to surprise. As he travels through this fictional world he encounters beings even more threatening and dangerous than his CrossTown neighbors. He navigates the physical and temporal pitfalls of his quest with equal parts cunning and thoughtlessness. How he evolves as he delves deeper and deeper into the mystery is every bit as important as the solution to the mystery.
Cooper proves himself a capable manipulator of possibility, probability and reality. The story is fast-moving, exciting and thought-provoking. I happily recommend CrossTown to all lovers of time travel, fantasy, science fiction and alternate reality.
Iowa City Book Festival
Iowa City Book Festival reading and political panel were a lot of fun. Larry Baker and I both read to a crowd reduced by Midwest rain, but a few souls braved the hazards of the morning.
The politics panel had representation from Pakistan, Indonesia, Canada, and the States, included poets and fiction writers, and prompted lively discussion on topics ranging from direct political pressure on artists to political environments and how they inform the work. Two primary points had general consensus: that political dissatisfaction can inspire, and didactism driven by dissatisfaction can undermine to merit of the work if it overwhelms the craft of the work.
Thanks to John Kenyon for the invite.
https://twitter.com/CrossTownauth?lan...
The politics panel had representation from Pakistan, Indonesia, Canada, and the States, included poets and fiction writers, and prompted lively discussion on topics ranging from direct political pressure on artists to political environments and how they inform the work. Two primary points had general consensus: that political dissatisfaction can inspire, and didactism driven by dissatisfaction can undermine to merit of the work if it overwhelms the craft of the work.
Thanks to John Kenyon for the invite.
https://twitter.com/CrossTownauth?lan...
October 26, 2017
Advance Praise for CrossTown
Reviewed by Pam LaCroix (Authors Den Reader Review)
CrossTown itself isn’t just the setting of this action-packed novel. It’s almost a character that grows, warps and folds on itself physically and temporally. One of the neighborhoods is described as designed by “the architect Escher.” I couldn’t stop mental images of hands drawing themselves and stairways appearing to ascend and descend at the same time. With its diverse population of sinister, mythical characters it seems a universe that parallels Wyoming’s Hole-in-the Wall of the late 1800’s.
Zethus, the primary character, is a powerful sorcerer whose ruthless morality continues to surprise. As he travels through this fictional world he encounters beings even more threatening and dangerous than his CrossTown neighbors. He navigates the physical and temporal pitfalls of his quest with equal parts cunning and thoughtlessness. How he evolves as he delves deeper and deeper into the mystery is every bit as important as the solution to the mystery.
Cooper proves himself a capable manipulator of possibility, probability and reality. The story is fast-moving, exciting and thought-provoking. I happily recommend CrossTown to all lovers of time travel, fantasy, science fiction and alternate reality.
A sorcerer explores the frontier of theoretical physics.
Calling himself a “spiritual thug for hire,” Zethus has the decidedly science-fictional ability to travel through alternate realities. Thanks to the mind-bending physics theory—made real in Cooper’s novel—that every decision we make creates a new universe, Zethus is able to conduct an investigation into his mentor’s murder that leads him from the Irish folkloric land of Faerie to the horror-novel NightTown, which is populated by vampires, to the science fictional TechTown, suffused with futuristic technology.
Publisher’s Weekly, article “Genre Mashups: Science Fiction and Fantasy"
“…A story of murder and revenge set in a world where anything is possible. Zethus is a sorcerer for hire in CrossTown, a place where the world's infinite possibilities are all available to those who know how to walk the branching Roads to alternate realities. With the help of his Legion of captured spirits, he takes on jobs like banishing troublesome ghosts for pay. But he should have known that a job that offered one golden hour just for meeting with a mysterious messenger was too good to be true. The job tangles him up with the world of Faerie, setting a remorseless hunter on his trail… Sorting out this whole tangle of plots and double-crosses, not to mention saving his own skin, will take Zethus on a journey through the darkest and wildest Ways in CrossTown—and require him to confront some uncomfortable truths about himself…”
Kirkus Reviews, CrossTown Advance Review
"...CrossTown is full of thrilling action, of hidden agendas, of narrow escapes. It is, in short, a lot of fun. But it's also a new version of one of the stories we need to tell ourselves again and again: The hero, wearing one of his thousand faces, seeks the elixir, in one of its thousand forms, and ends up being surprised, elevated, bereft, and consoled. And we, as readers, take that same journey through heights and depths to arrive at contemplation. This is a novel that offers its own answer to the question of what we are to do with the gift, the privilege, of our human birth..."
-Bruce Holland Rogers, from the Introduction to CrossTown
CrossTown is a fascinating mix of mystery, science fiction and mythology/folklore/magic. Loren Cooper let us travel with the flawed sorcerer Zethus as he searches for answers through layers of realities, all connected by a range of multi-level roads crossing within, above, and below the town of the title. At one point, we encounter the powerful and frightening Fae of Irish tradition; at another, a community of vampires and other creatures of the night; at still another, a future world of high-tech weaponry--and more. The result is a wonderfully woven whole thanks to the story-telling, the pace, and the character of Zethus himself. Here's hoping for more adventures in this fantastic and believable world.
--Wayne Ude, award-winning author of Maybe I will Do Something: Seven Tales of Coyote, Becoming Coyote, and Buffalo and Other Stories.
"In Crosstown, fantasy and folklore wake up in the bed of science fiction... and it works!"
--Bruce Holland Rogers, World Fantasy, Nebula, and Pushcart award winner.
CrossTown itself isn’t just the setting of this action-packed novel. It’s almost a character that grows, warps and folds on itself physically and temporally. One of the neighborhoods is described as designed by “the architect Escher.” I couldn’t stop mental images of hands drawing themselves and stairways appearing to ascend and descend at the same time. With its diverse population of sinister, mythical characters it seems a universe that parallels Wyoming’s Hole-in-the Wall of the late 1800’s.
Zethus, the primary character, is a powerful sorcerer whose ruthless morality continues to surprise. As he travels through this fictional world he encounters beings even more threatening and dangerous than his CrossTown neighbors. He navigates the physical and temporal pitfalls of his quest with equal parts cunning and thoughtlessness. How he evolves as he delves deeper and deeper into the mystery is every bit as important as the solution to the mystery.
Cooper proves himself a capable manipulator of possibility, probability and reality. The story is fast-moving, exciting and thought-provoking. I happily recommend CrossTown to all lovers of time travel, fantasy, science fiction and alternate reality.
A sorcerer explores the frontier of theoretical physics.
Calling himself a “spiritual thug for hire,” Zethus has the decidedly science-fictional ability to travel through alternate realities. Thanks to the mind-bending physics theory—made real in Cooper’s novel—that every decision we make creates a new universe, Zethus is able to conduct an investigation into his mentor’s murder that leads him from the Irish folkloric land of Faerie to the horror-novel NightTown, which is populated by vampires, to the science fictional TechTown, suffused with futuristic technology.
Publisher’s Weekly, article “Genre Mashups: Science Fiction and Fantasy"
“…A story of murder and revenge set in a world where anything is possible. Zethus is a sorcerer for hire in CrossTown, a place where the world's infinite possibilities are all available to those who know how to walk the branching Roads to alternate realities. With the help of his Legion of captured spirits, he takes on jobs like banishing troublesome ghosts for pay. But he should have known that a job that offered one golden hour just for meeting with a mysterious messenger was too good to be true. The job tangles him up with the world of Faerie, setting a remorseless hunter on his trail… Sorting out this whole tangle of plots and double-crosses, not to mention saving his own skin, will take Zethus on a journey through the darkest and wildest Ways in CrossTown—and require him to confront some uncomfortable truths about himself…”
Kirkus Reviews, CrossTown Advance Review
"...CrossTown is full of thrilling action, of hidden agendas, of narrow escapes. It is, in short, a lot of fun. But it's also a new version of one of the stories we need to tell ourselves again and again: The hero, wearing one of his thousand faces, seeks the elixir, in one of its thousand forms, and ends up being surprised, elevated, bereft, and consoled. And we, as readers, take that same journey through heights and depths to arrive at contemplation. This is a novel that offers its own answer to the question of what we are to do with the gift, the privilege, of our human birth..."
-Bruce Holland Rogers, from the Introduction to CrossTown
CrossTown is a fascinating mix of mystery, science fiction and mythology/folklore/magic. Loren Cooper let us travel with the flawed sorcerer Zethus as he searches for answers through layers of realities, all connected by a range of multi-level roads crossing within, above, and below the town of the title. At one point, we encounter the powerful and frightening Fae of Irish tradition; at another, a community of vampires and other creatures of the night; at still another, a future world of high-tech weaponry--and more. The result is a wonderfully woven whole thanks to the story-telling, the pace, and the character of Zethus himself. Here's hoping for more adventures in this fantastic and believable world.
--Wayne Ude, award-winning author of Maybe I will Do Something: Seven Tales of Coyote, Becoming Coyote, and Buffalo and Other Stories.
"In Crosstown, fantasy and folklore wake up in the bed of science fiction... and it works!"
--Bruce Holland Rogers, World Fantasy, Nebula, and Pushcart award winner.
