Joshua Reynolds's Blog, page 50

Zibaldone #13: Dr. Voronoff of Wych Street

Let’s start the week off right with a few more odds and sods from my commonplace books. This time, its all about nonexistent streets, monkey testicles and lost plays.

Wych Street. Decrepit Elizabethan housing, projecting wooden jetties, and the mysterious ‘bookstalls of Wych Street’. Demolished in 1901, but…what if? I think this one stuck in my head just because of the name, likely from the Old English wice, meaning ‘bend’ or somesuch, though you could also draw a link to ‘witch’, for obvious reasons. One street, broken into two and erased. I’m fascinated by the psychogeographic implications of such an act. Wych Street was an edgeland between old London and new, broken apart at the beginning of the Twentieth Century. But what if it was still there, in some form? What if Wych Street, with its strange bookstalls and decrepit houses, was, like its name, bent just out of sight?

Dr. Voronoff and his monkey testicles. This…pretty much speaks for itself, right? Experimental surgery. Monkey testicles. Mad scientist. Monkey testicles. Animal-to-human transplants. C’mon. I shouldn’t have to explain this one.

The Isle of Dogs. 1597 play by Ben Jonson and Thomas Nashe. Performed once and immediately suppressed, for unspecified reasons. A satirical comedy, possibly aimed at the Queen. Players were arrested, homes were raided, and also, stolen jewels were involved, maybe. A lot of weird elements, adding up to a larger, more complex whole. Was it all about politics? Or did it have more to do with a certain stolen diamond? All of the above? Who knows–probably make a good story, though.

Ave Dominus Dracula

The new Royal Occultist novel, The Infernal Express, has been out for about two weeks now, and I thought I’d say a bit more about it, in case anyone reading this is on the fence about picking up a copy.

I’ve written about the idea behind the book already. I’ve also written about why I think Dracula is such an enduring villain. But I haven’t written much about the story itself, and the characters involved.

As to the latter, there’s the Royal Occultist, obviously. Charles St. Cyprian and his assistant, Ebe Gallowglass, have had numerous adventures over the years, and encountered more than one literary figure, including Sherlock Holmes, Randolph Carter and a bevy of famous (or infamous) occult detectives. In The Infernal Express, they encounter Dracula and his servants, the Order of the Dragon, but also a number of other literary vampires, including Lord Ruthven and the diabolical Mrs. Amworth.

They also encounter the mysterious Miss Harker, a pale young woman of sinister parentage. Harker is a holdover from an earlier version of the story and acts as a bridge between that novel and The Infernal Express. Harker, and her allies in the Westenra Fund, also provide both books with their respective (and requisite) links to Bram Stoker’s original novel. Too, I wanted to play with the concept of the dhampir, as well as create a character who had a personal stake in keeping Dracula dead and buried. Harker fit the bill on both counts.

Besides Harker, the book also introduces gentleman necromancer and automobile enthusiast, Andre du Nord. I’ve been wanting to develop the world of the Royal Occultist a bit more, and since we’ve seen who the Americans turn to for occult problems, I figured it was time to introduce St. Cyprian’s French counterpart. I’m hoping that I can bring both du Nord and Harker back at some point, or even write a proper spin-off adventure or two for one or both of them…but more on that later, I think.

The Infernal Express is now available in electronic format. A print edition will be out in the next few days, if you prefer your books to take up space on something other than a hard drive. Reviews are always welcome, and if you’re interested in keeping up-to-date on the world of the Royal Occultist please be sure to ‘Like’ the Facebook page and set your bookmarks for http://royaloccultist.wordpress.com/.

WIP Wednesday #21: Abiding Folly

The work continues apace. Inspiration is ground beneath the stone of process, turned into the millet of…something? Never mind. Anyway, week 21. Wonders and horrors abide herein.

Well, not really. Fairly standard. I’m still working on the novella for Imperiad Entertainment–working title “The Divine Drowned”–at a nice clip. I hit 33,000 words today, leaving somewhere between 7 and 10,000 to go before I run up against my word limit. I plan on finishing it up this weekend, if possible. Work on this one has been relatively steady, which is always nice. I’ve got the rhythm of it now, just in time to wrap up the first draft.

If you’re wondering, by ‘steady’ I mean 2-3000 words per day. I don’t actually know when or why I settled on 2,000 words as my per diem target. At 2,000 words a day, seven days a week, I can have an 80,000 word draft finished in roughly little over a month. Those 2,000 words tend to take me 2-4 hours a day, which theoretically leaves me bags of time to work on other projects.

In practice, that happens less than I’d like. Sometimes writing those 2,000 words is about all I can manage, before I need to recharge my batteries. Other times, I’ll do 3 or 4,000 words per project, per day for a few days. But for the most part, it caps out at 2 a day, for a grand total of 14,000 a week. Not a huge amount, but dependable.

Besides the novella, I managed to edit both “The Hound’s Daughter” and “The Thunder, His Passing” on Sunday and Monday. I added some words, a fight scene or two, and pruned a few of the more indulgent sections of dialogue before submitting both. That makes for seven stories written and submitted for the year so far. Three of those have already been accepted for publication, which is a pretty good rate. I’ve only got one other on the go at the moment–the previously mentioned “Cemetery Gun”, which I’m hoping to get back to next week.

I don’t have any particular market in mind for it. Sometimes it’s nice to just write something for the fun of it, rather than having a market in mind. No worrying about deadlines or word counts. Just letting the story go where it wants. I should probably do it more often.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been working on. In other news, Phileas Fogg and the Heart of Osra is still available to preorder, and The Infernal Express is available to download. Why not grab a copy of one or both?

Monday Acclamation

In lieu of anything substantial, here’s some modest puffery to start the week…

First up, Bill Adcock of Paperback Perils has reviewed an early ARC of Phileas Fogg and the Heart of Osra…

Reynolds’ two novellas so far (with hopefully many more to come, as hinted in the text) are not only wholly satisfying sequels to Farmer’s original novels, but richly enjoyable on their own, deepening the back story of Farmer’s take on the Eighty-Day Affair, and adding a new level of complexity to the Eridanean-Capellan conflict and its participants.

And Tyler Mengel of Mengel’s Miniatures has reviewed Legends of the Age of Sigmar: Black Rift…

It’s amazing to me how a story that is really just one long battle as the Stormcast breach the outer walls of the city in the first chapter and assault the central area in the last, can be so interesting and characterful. It really didn’t feel like just one battle and I was completely enthralled the entire time.

Legends of the Age of Sigmar: Black Rift is available from Black Library in both hardback and digital format. Phileas Fogg and the Heart of Osra is available to preorder through Meteor House through June 15th. And if you haven’t already, why not grab a copy of Phileas Fogg and the War of Shadows, available now for the Kindle.

Weekend Weird: From Beyond the Beyond

A dose of weird for your weekend…From Beyond the Beyond. A short film by Chris Lackey and Greig Johnson, based on “From Beyond”, a short story by HP Lovecraft.

The Valley So Low

It’s the rhythm, ain’t it? The song is familiar, but the rhythm is unique. It goes its own way, reaching down deep into those places where only a born few can navigate. That’s what a Manly Wade Wellman story is like. Familiar lyrics, but a rhythm all its own.

I’ve spoken before about my love for Wellman’s writing. It was–and is–a constant source of inspiration for me. The voice of the mountains ain’t quite my voice, but it’s near enough to be of comfort. That comfort brings me back to Wellman’s work again and again, even though by now I can recite some of those stories from memory.

While the stories of John and his silver-stringed guitar are the ones I seek out for comfort, it’s the stories of the other John–John Thunstone–and the hulking Judge Pursuivant that I come back to for regular entertainment. They’re the sort of characters that stick with you, if you’re of a certain turn of mind.

They’re less elemental than John and his guitar, and fiercer. Active, rather than reactive, with a mandate to face evil in all its forms, wherever it dares wander. They’re the familiar lyrics in Wellman’s song, the ones you’ve heard before, but never *quite* like he sings them. The old trappings are there–the dusty tomes, the hard-won knowledge–but serve mostly to contrast with the older, truer wisdoms. A bit of silver and faith goes a longer way in a Wellman story than a spell from an eldritch grimoire. The tools of Hell should be left there, and if you can but lay hands on the Devil, his fury shrinks.

If you’re interested, I contributed pieces on both Thunstone and Pursuivant to Black Gate Magazine, back when I had the time for such things. Today’s a good a day as any to share them. Happy birthday, Mr. Wellman. Wherever you are, I hope it’s a good one.

“The Nightmare Men: The Judge”

“Don’t you think a man always recognizes a woman he has loved?”

-Judge Pursuivant, “Chastel”

“The Nightmare Men: The Enemy of Evil”

“Sic pereant inimici tui, Domine.”

-John Thunstone, “Rouse Him Not”

WIP Wednesday #20: In the Boat of Ra

WIP Wednesday is twenty weeks old. How about that?

Today I hit 18k on the current project, which is not quite the halfway mark, but close. This one is going a bit slower than I like, due mainly to having to get used to a new IP, and trying to internalize all of the info that goes with it. I figure I’ll get it down about the time I get done. That’s how it usually goes. Anyway, right now I’m writing about the boat of Ra, time dilation, giant snakes made out of rock and lost cities, so it could be worse.

Over the weekend, I finished my submission for Sharkpunk 2. Now I just need to find time to edit both it and my story for the Pulpwork Halloween Special. I’m fairly happy with “The Thunder, His Passing”. I got to work in a pretty neat astral journey sequence, at least, and introduce a new character to the Royal Occultist mythos.

I don’t know if it’s as subtle as I was hoping, however. In fact, I know it’s not. But that’s okay. It’s still a different sort of Royal Occultist story, more in the style of “In the Dark and Quiet” or “Hairy Shanks”…there’s no monster to be defeated, really. It’s about etiquette, more than silver bullets. That sounds weird, I know, but I think it works. We’ll see whether or not the editors agree with me.

Besides that, I took a few days to complete my revisions for the second Novel-With-No-Name. Not so heavy as the revisions to the first, but still substantial enough to warrant setting aside a day or two for them.  It’s probably one of the better books I’ve written, I think. I hope. Or, at least I enjoyed working on it. I haven’t played with some of those characters in a while, and it was nice to get back to them, and pick up where we left off. Hopefully readers will think the same.

I also spent some time writing up some quick pitches for a few things. Nothing I can talk about in any detail, but I’m excited about them–or, whichever of them gets picked up.

And that’s pretty much it for this week so far.

Osra’s Heart

Meteor House has revealed the cover for Phileas Fogg and the Heart of Osra, my forthcoming novella. The art is by the phenomenal Amar Djouad, who also did the cover for Phileas Fogg and the War of Shadows. 

Isn’t that awesome? Spoiler alert–that’s an actual scene from the book. Phileas Fogg (in stolen clothes) and Rupert of Hentzau (with the pistol), about to ride a chandelier into adventure.

From the blurb:

1889. The war of shadows is over, but a new and more deadly conflict has begun in the Central European country of Ruritania. A conflict which threatens to consume the few remaining survivors of the millennia-old struggle between Eridaneans and Capelleans, including Phileas Fogg. Drawn to the city of Streslau by a mysterious letter, Fogg finds himself accused of a crime he didn’t commit and caught between old allies and new enemies in a struggle for survival. On the run and aided only by the unpredictable Count of Hentzau, Fogg must exert every iota of his famed intellect in order to unravel the mystery of the Heart of Osra – or face the utter annihilation of Eridaneans and Capelleans alike!

Phileas Fogg and the Heart of Osra is now available for preorder. And there are still a few (very few!) copies of Phileas Fogg and the War of Shadows available. You can also download a digital copy of War of Shadows if you prefer your books as bits (of data).

The Shadow of Dracula

Let’s start the week off right, shall we? With a story about a story, and the permutations thereof. Also about the barnacle-like nature of certain ideas and how you can never *quite* do them justice, no matter how many times you give it a go. 

So, if you were paying attention, The Infernal Express came out last week. On Friday the 13th, appropriately enough. It’s a book wherein the Royal Occultist takes the skull of Dracula on a long-distance haul across Europe, in order to turn it over to a foreign government for political reasons. In one way or another, it is a story I’ve tried to write on at least two occasions. It has gone through various permutations, chronologically and narratively, as well as stylistically.

Originally, it wasn’t a Royal Occultist story. But it did feature an occult detective, of sorts–namely Arthur Holmwood, the Lord Godalming. When I first had the rough inkling of the idea to stick Dracula’s skull on the Orient Express, bound for Istanbul, it was a loose sequel to Bram Stoker’s original novel. Lord Godalming, I theorized, would have had his horizons broadened in the aftermath of his encounter with the supernatural. His wealth and status would have been bent towards learning more about the occult, in order to better defend against future incursions of the eldritch. It was a whole thing…I imagined it as the first book in a series, detailing Lord Godalming’s growing obsession with the occult. He would go from the staid, stiff figure of Dracula to a more eccentric character, and his cross-continental adventure with the skull of Dracula would have been the first step on that journey.

Anyway, that didn’t pan out. I wasn’t certain I wanted to tie things so closely to Bram Stoker’s work, and I wasn’t certain anyone would buy a story set in pre-war Europe, involving a British eccentric carrying a skull to Istanbul. So I put it aside and went on to other things. But ideas aren’t that easy to shake. So, a year later, I got to discussing story ideas with my good friends Joel Jenkins and Derrick Ferguson (both great writers, btw, and you should check out their stuff post-haste), and came up with the idea of Dracula as a James Bond-esque villain. A nod to Gene Colan and Marv Wolfman’s brilliant Tomb of Dracula, with Dracula running this global Satanic network of cults and agents. I wrote the first book, Dracula Lives!, and published it through Pulpwork Press in 2010.

I reworked elements of my original idea into Dracula Lives!–the persistence of Dracula’s ghost, the competing factions of vampires, Satanists and government agencies all seeking to claim Dracula for themselves–and added some new factors–a dhampir named Harker and the Westenra Fund–to the mix, to create a sort of John le Carre/Hammer Horror mashup. I left out the Orient Express, obviously, because the book was set in modern times and people use planes these days.

It didn’t sell well.

Plans for the series were scuppered, and once more, the original idea went into a drawer. Until about a year or so ago, when I was looking around for an idea for the third Royal Occultist novel. So once again, I pulled out my old idea, gave it a new coat of paint, and set about making it fit into the world of the Royal Occultist. Which was no easy thing, by the way…Dracula is akin to Sherlock Holmes in that he’s a character that rapidly dominates any narrative he’s in. Hence my use of Dracula as a force literally seeking to dominate the main character, and usurp his existence…but that’s a discussion for another time.

The Infernal Express is now available in electronic format. A print edition will be out in the next few days, if you prefer your books to take up space on something other than a hard drive. Reviews are always welcome, and if you’re interested in keeping up-to-date on the world of the Royal Occultist please be sure to ‘Like’ the Facebook page and set your bookmarks for http://royaloccultist.wordpress.com/.

Ride the Infernal Express

Armies ride to war as the vampire-king stirs in his bloody slumber. The Royal Occultist races against the Devil, but no matter how swift he flees, the Devil is always just behind. For the dead have ever traveled fast…

From Emby Press:

In this third and most harrowing adventure, the Royal Occultist faces a terror with no equal… Charged with the safe-keeping of the remains of Dracula, Charles St. Cyprian and Ebe Gallowglass depart London and race across Europe in death-defying mission to pass the remains over to those that can hopefully keep and guard them. As one might guess, nothing goes as planned.

The world of The Royal Occultist continues to grow at an explosive rate and in the tradition of “The Whitechapel Demon” and “The Jade Suit of Death”, Reynolds once again proves why his occult detective and apprentice (or assistant, depending on who you ask) are two of the very best characters in modern literature.

If you are looking for rip-roaring adventure combined with supernatural sleuthing, this is your call to board The Infernal Express!

The long-awaited third volume in The Adventures of the Royal Occultist is finally here, and available in electronic format via Amazon and the international variations thereof. The print version will be along in the next week or so, but until then, feel free to content yourself with the Kindle edition.

This book has been a long time coming, and I want to thank all the folks who’ve been waiting so patiently for it. I’ll be talking a bit more about it over the coming weeks. And if you’re interested in keeping up-to-date on the world of the Royal Occultist please be sure to ‘Like’ the Facebook page and set your bookmarks for http://royaloccultist.wordpress.com/.