Joshua Reynolds's Blog, page 35

Return of the Widowmaker

Today sees the beginning of Necromunda Week at Black Library, and starting things off is the release of my newest short story, “Death’s Head”.

[image error]

From the blurb:

There are few names in Necromunda’s underhive that inspire as much fear and dread as that of Lothar Hex. An assassin of unparalleled skill, known as the Widowmaker, his tally of kills is impressive. Rebellious gang leaders, guilders and even the entire populations of small settlements have fallen to his uncanny skills. To cross his path is to court death. So why is Topek Greel, a Goliath ganger, seeking him out? The answer is sure to come with a large helping of blood-soaked mayhem, plenty of murder and Hex’s traditional calling card, the Death’s Head…

Lothar Hex. Anyone else remember him? He was one of my favourite parts of Necromunda, way back in the day. And now I get to reintroduce him to whole new generation of underhivers.

Necromunda was my game. Not Warhammer 40,000, not Warhammer Fantasy. Necromunda. Give me a ganger armed with a stub-gun, a knife and a variety of serious injuries and/or utterly random skill advancements over Space Marines any day of the week. I want bounty hunters and hired scum and Karloth Valois.

Oh, how I hated Karloth Valois.

Remember sustained fire dice? Those were great. I miss sustained fire dice. The thrill of multiple jams when you try and mow down your opponent’s Orlocks as they sprint towards your Cawdor, murder in their eyes. But when it worked…oh, when it worked it was a thing of beauty.

When I first started writing for Black Library, I didn’t want to write 40K or Fantasy. I wanted to write Necromunda. I wanted to write about sump-tenders and mould-farmers. I wanted to write about bounty hunters, chasing desperate outlanders into downhive. About cheap, black market bionics and bottles of Wildsnake.

And now, finally, I get my chance.

Anyway, this is but the first of many forays into the underhive. There’ll be more stories this week from Robbie MacNiven, Guy Haley and others.  You can get all six of them for the price of four, at this handy subscription link, if you’re interested. Or you can buy “Death’s Head” as a standalone digital download here.

Welcome to the Underhive. Hope you survive the experience.

Horus Heresy Weekender

Quick note to say I’ll be at the Horus Heresy Weekender this weekend, signing books and talking about my forthcoming audio drama, Blackshields: The Red Fief. Or whatever you want to talk about, really. I’m not particular.

The Red Fief is a sequel to last year’s Blackshields: The False War, and finds Endryd Haar and co. on a collision course with a ghost from Haar’s past. It’s due for general release this summer, but will be available super-early for attendees of the Weekender. So if you’re planning on being there, why not stop by and say hello?

[image error]

Is Creating Short Stories

Early last year, I decided to bite the bullet and set up a Patreon account. There are a number of reasons for this. Simple pragmatism was one. Multiple income streams are a necessity for a professional writer, these days. But I also had a desire to see if I could make it work. I’ve tried various forms of self-publishing over the years, and Patreon’s relatively idiot-proof set-up appealed to me – simple, efficient, with minimal investment, and potentially maximum profit.

With the first year safely in the bag, I find myself cautiously optimistic for 2018. My initial assessment of Patreon as a minimal investment income stream – the way I use it, at least – was proven solid. As an alternative to the regular submission grind, it has significant benefits. Immediacy for one, as well as a direct connection between myself and my readers. Too, it allows me to make use of short stories that were accepted for publication, but failed to appear in print, as well as those that never managed to find the right market. And, frankly, Patreon was ready-made  for reprints.

All in all, I’m highly satisfied with the way this experiment has turned out. That said, I intend to make better use of my Patreon in the coming year. I’ll be posting fewer stories, for one thing, but attempting to publicise them in a more effective fashion – several of the ones I posted this past year completely fell through the cracks. I’ll also be conducting research throughout the year, in order to find out what current patrons want to see more of – and what might encourage potential patrons to give things a look.

But for the moment, why not check out my newest patron-only story, “The Second Occupant”? It features mummies and magic in Jazz Age London, and finds the Royal Occultist and his assistant pitted against a nightmare out of time, as well as an all-too human evil.

Leeds & Sheffield Signings

Quick note to say that I’ll be doing signings this weekend for my new Black Library novel, Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix, at Waterstones Leeds on Saturday from 12-2, and Games Workshop: Sheffield on Sunday, also from 12-2. So if you’re around either place, on either day, feel free to stop by and say hello.

[image error]

Night Battlers

An entry from my commonplace book to start the week off. This time around, it’s various infernal infants, night battlers and good walkers.

Cambion. ‘A crooked child’. The offspring of an incubus or a succubus, and a human being – or possibly the child of demons, using the human as a surrogate. Also a term that might refer to a changeling, depending on how you rate de Plancy.

Dhampir. The child of a human and a vampire. Like our friend above, a popular archetypal protagonist of urban fantasy fiction, as dhampirs are said to be able to see invisible vampires and practice sorcery, making them effective vampire hunters.

Krsnik. Speaking of vampire hunters, the Slavic krsnik, is an interesting one. Their soul leaves their body, assuming the shape of a white animal, in order to fight evil. Which is a pretty interesting ability.

Zduhac. Dragon man. Fighter of demons and controller of the weather. Or possibly a crop-thief. Or all of the above. Slightly confusing, but interesting. Why are they called a dragon man? Who knows. Sounds cool, though.

Benandanti. The Good Walkers. Good witches, or possibly werewolves, or something else entirely. Spirit travellers and lucid dreamers. Definitely pick up Carlo Ginzburg’s book, The Night Battles: Witchcraft and Agrarian Cults in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, which is fascinating, if somewhat dry, reading on the subject. Also read Benito Cereno’s Hector Plasm comics, which are awesome.  

Any one of these entries might provide impetus for a short story or several. Probably why I wrote them all down. I should probably get on that, at some point.

[image error]

For the Curious…

Newcastle Signing

Quick note to say that I’ll be doing a signing this Saturday for my new Black Library novel, Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix, at the Travelling Man, in Newcastle, from 12 – 2. If you’re in town, feel free to come by and say hello.

[image error]

Crystal Sun

The first short story of 2018 has arrived, courtesy of the Black Library. “Light of a Crystal Sun” finds Fabius Bile, desperate to stop his body’s degeneration, trying to use remnants of an aeldari seer, crystallised but still powerful, to discover the secrets of life after death and bring himself immortality…

[image error]

From the blurb:

For centuries, Fabius Bile has performed vile genetic experiments, torturing and killing thousands to create twisted hybrids of life. But now, a new challenge emerges. He seeks to use the power and knowledge of the ancient aeldari in order to save his own life from the illness that ravages his body, As he connects his consciousness to fragments of a crystal seer stolen from the heart of Craftworld Lugganath, he faces peril unlike any he has ever experienced before. Can Fabius hold out against the psychic might of the infinity circuit, or will his mind die before even his body does?

“Light of a Crystal Sun” takes place between Fabius Bile: Primogenitor and Fabius Bile: Clonelord, and finds Fabius engaged in an Inception-like descent into the mind of a long dead aeldari seer.

This was an interesting one to write. I wanted to do something slightly psychedelic, and I think, for the most part, I succeeded. I also wanted to highlight Fabius’ towering arrogance and determination, by having him bite off a bit more than he could chew, during one of his schemes. I’d say the conjoined consciousnesses of several aeldari seers qualifies. But why not decide for yourself?

“Light of a Crystal Sun” is available as a digital download from Black Library, as well as via Amazon.com and its subsidiaries, as a Kindle download. If you’re interested, here’s an early review of the story from Michael Dodd, over at Track of Words. And be sure to check out the new Fabius Bile series page, at the Black Library site.

Station Identification

[image error]

For me, the first day of a new year always brings with it the scent of new possibilities and potential. It’s a day to clean up the office, and tidy my work space. To finish up the last of the previous year’s obligations, and make room for the ones to come.

It’s also the perfect day to remind new readers and old of who I am, and what this site is all about. So. My name is Josh Reynolds, and I’m a writer, occasional editor and semi-professional monster movie enthusiast.

I have been a professional author since 2007, and have had over twenty novels published in that time, as well as a wealth of shorter fiction pieces, including short stories, novellas and the occasional audio script. An up-to-date list of my published work, including licensed fiction for Games Workshop’s Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40,000 lines, can be found on this site.

I grew up in South Carolina,  a place where hoodoo is still regularly practised. Where vampire-trees are marked with witch-sign and where soul-bottles are hung from branches. Where people paint their houses blue to keep out hungry ghosts and never burn wood from a tree where someone’s been hanged. In retrospect, my chosen vocation is, perhaps, unsurprising.

While this site is mostly a place to promote my work, and update readers on new releases, appearances and the like, it is also what I like to call a ‘secondary creative outlet’. Less pretentiously, it’s a place where I occasionally talk about my writing and what goes into it, as well as various other things that attract my interest. Mostly monster movies, and neat bits of ephemera I collect or produce.

I have all the requisite social media – Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr – and you can also ask me questions about my writing via ask.fm and this site. Occasionally, I might even answer.

Should you wish to sample my work before you purchase it, I encourage you to have a look at my free fiction page. There are short stories, serials and even a few audios. If you feel like risking a dollar, you could also check out some of the short stories on my Patreon page.

There. Now we’re all caught up. On with the show.

2017 Recap

This was a weird year. It wasn’t just me, right?

Speaking for myself, it was a hard one, for various reasons. I set out with good intentions – I wanted to work smarter this year, rather than harder, and wound up doing neither. I wanted to dial back my time wasting on social media and get this site humming along, but fell back into bad habits fairly quickly. A hundred little blue devils of delay and distraction nipped at my heels and never quite let up.

For whatever reason, I lost my stride, somewhere around the middle of the year, and never quite caught back up – I struggled to hit my deadlines, and had to say ‘no’ to quite a few projects I was otherwise looking forward to doing. In fact, I am, even now, working desperately to finish up the last book of this year, before January 1st rolls around. Luckily, I’ve only got around 10k words to go, and around fifty hours to do it in.

Plenty of time.

All that said, I did manage to accomplish a few things, despite my inability to manage a schedule. By midnight on December 31st, I will have managed to have written a goodly amount of words, including four novels for Black Library, and a new story for what will hopefully be the first of several Royal Occultist short story collections.

Too, I co-edited the Cryptid Clash! novella series, alongside James Bojaciuk. Featuring stories by some fantastic authors, including Gav Thorpe and William Meikle, the series has been popular enough to warrant a follow-up, next year.

I also managed to successfully set up my Patreon page, after several years of dithering. I did a number of interviews, and even a few public appearances. I’ll be doing more of those next year, by the way, if you’re interested.

Besides all of that, I had a not-insubstantial amount of fiction published this year. We’ll start with audios first, since there was only one.

2017, Blackshields: The False War, CD/MP3 Release, Black Library

Novel-wise, I only had four published this year, all for Black Library this time around. I also had several of my earlier Black Library novels reprinted, in one form or another.

2017, Fabius Bile: Clonelord, Black Library
2017, Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix, Black Library
2017, Eight Lamentations: Spear of Shadows, Black Library
2017, Hallowed Knights: Plague Garden, Black Library

I had two novellas published this year, one of which was part of the Cryptid Clash! series. The other was an introductory piece for the Age of Sigmar setting, meant to appeal to new readers.

2017, Cryptid Clash!: Inzignanin, 18thWall Productions
2017, “Hammerhal”, Hammerhal & Other Stories, Black Library

Regarding short stories, I had around twenty-four published this year. Roughly half of those were on Patreon, which makes it much less impressive, if you think about it. Four of the remaining thirteen were for Black Library, with the others appearing in publications such as Occult Detective Quarterly as well as various anthologies.

2017, “The Tainted Axe”, Advent Calendar 2017, Black Library
2017, “The Second Occupant”, Patreon Backer Story #11
2017, “A Dirge of Dust and Steel”, Events Anthology 2017/18, Black Library
2017, “The Maltese Tiger”, Patreon Backer Story #10
2017, “The Bride of the Hound”, Pulpwork Halloween Special, Pulpwork Press
2017, “Laying the Hairy Book”, Weirdbook Annual, Wildside Press
2017, “The Uninvited Guest”, Speakeasies & Spiritualists, 18th Wall Productions
2017, “The Tiger, At Large”, Patreon Backer Story #9
2017, “Auction of Blood”, Summer of Reading, Black Library
2017, “Those Folk Below”, Arkham Detective Agency, Dark Regions Press
2017, “The Roaring Ship”, Free Patreon Story #1
2017, “Murder is a Meal for Two”, Gumshoe Review July 2017 issue
2017, “The Bayonet”, Patreon Backer Story #7
2017, “Tenebre Dark”, Weird Ales: Last Orders, KnightWatch Press
2017, “Cemetery Gun”, Patreon Backer Story #6
2017, “The Occult Legion: Terror on the Links”, Occult Detective Quarterly, issue 2
2017, “The Charnel Hounds”, Patreon Backer Story #5
2017, “The Waters So Dark”, Broadswords & Blasters, issue 1
2017, “Máscara contra Murciélago”, Patreon Backer Story #4
2017, “The Cult of the Horrible”, Patreon Backer Story #3
2017, “The Black Brotherhood”, Weird Heroes #3, Pro Se Press
2017, “Barnard’s Law”, Patreon Backer Story #2
2017, “Orbis Tertius”, Occult Detective Quarterly, issue 1
2017, “The Black Pullet”, Patreon Backer Story #1
2017, “A Trick of the Light”, Monday Quick Read, Black Library

And that’s the story of 2017, pretty much.

Roll on 2018.