Marko Kloos's Blog, page 2

CORVUS author copies & future giveaways

Look what made it in yesterday—my author copies of CORVUS, second installment in the Frontlines: Evolution series, out on August 19th.

I’ll probably do the traditional giveaway again, but I think that a few changes are necessary. During the last giveaway, I had several of the international deliveries returned to me, incloduing one where the customs service of the reader’s home country levied an import tax and the reader was unwilling to cover it. For every refused delivery or wrong address return, I get to eat the cost of shipping (which is over $20 for a paperback to most international locations), and the returned book is personalized and can’t be sold or given to anyone else. Add to that the current tariff situation, and sending books internationally is too unpredictable and expensive for me right now. I already cover the shipping, and I generally take a full day to personalize the books, package them, and haul them to the post office. Having to figure out customs duties or tariffs and then potentially eating them myself is just not something I want to add on top of everything else.

If you’re a non-US-based reader, I know that this may be disappointing, but I am not a millionaire and I don’t have support staff. Until the tariff and international shipping situation changes, I’m going to have to curtail the scope of the giveaways and limit them to the U.S. and Canada. Sorry about that, and I hope things will change before the next book release so I can include international readers again without rolling the dice on setting $40 on fire with every padded envelope I send out.

This muppet

It is said that when they handed out the cuteness at the creator’s forge, Andy here kept getting back in line for more.

Baby snek

This is Cinnamon the corn snake, child #2’s new pet. A friend of mine said that this shot should be on the r/accidentalrenaissance subreddit.

If the progress bars on the right are moving a little slowly right now, it’s because I took on another super-secret project that has a tight schedule, so I had to bump it up ahead of everything else on the production schedule. Can’t say what it is just yet (and probably not for a while) or whether it will pan out, but if it does, I’ll be sure to tell you all about it. Rest assured that it’s super cool and awesome.

CORVUS ARCs are here

I received the customary box of advance reader copies for CORVUS, second book in the Frontlines: Evolution series, which will be out on August 19th.

If you’re a reviewer, lit blogger, BookToker or YouTuber interested in a review copy, send me an email at marko.kloos@gmail.com, and I’ll send you an ARC free of charge per media mail on a first-come, first-serve basis, or provide you with a NetGalley link for an electronic copy.

(Please don’t ask for one just to get an early/free read if you’re not a reviewer. I will get a box of author copies and do my regular giveaway with those as we get closer to release day.)

Please don’t send me your stuff

Quick PSA: 

Unless I have an existing, mutually agreed-upon working relationship with you, please do not send me your writing for critique, review, or other professional feedback.

I don’t have the time to read your stuff, and I don’t want the legal exposure. Even if I did have the time to read your novel—which I don’t because my schedule is stacked with my own projects—I can’t look at what you send me because I don’t want to be on the receiving end of a future lawsuit that claims I ripped off your work in one of my own stories. 

(And no, I am not interested in writing a novel with or for anyone else, regardless of how amazing your idea may be, or how certain you are that it will lead to untold riches for us both. See the paragraph above about the legal exposure thing.)

I get such requests on a semi-regular basis, but they’ve picked up lately for some reason, so I am putting this out here to discourage future requests. This isn’t me pulling the ladder up and thinking I am too good to help out new writers. It’s to protect myself against copyright claims and to minimize the chances of someone showing up at my place one day with a framing hammer, a bunch of zip ties, and an unshakeable conviction that I stole their idea for a novel. 

Work in progress is progressed

As you can see from the progress bar to the right, the novella for the secret project is done. As it often happens, I overshot my word count target, but in this case I overshot it by rather a lot. I had planned for 19,000 words give or take a thousand and ended up with 27,000.

No, I can’t tell you yet what it is because I am not at liberty to spill the beans. But rest assured that I’ll share the news as soon as I can.

Now I get to take a few days off to reset the brain, and then it’s full speed ahead with the next two projects: finishing the Halley story (which you should see out this quarter), and starting the draft for Palladium Wars #5, the as-of-yet-untitled “E” novel. Because 47North passed on continuing the series, I’ll be publishing that one independently, so you should see it in the first half of this year.

I’ve also been working on some new short fiction and a few other fun projects, so stay tuned for more news and UNEXPECTED FICTION-SHAPED SURPRISES.

Ethnic food, Westphalian style

 

Scrapple is a great example of a polarizing food—people either love it or think it’s abominable.

I happen to love it because it’s substantially similar to Panhas, a traditional Westphalian food that was one of my comfort dishes growing up. (The recipe for Panhas was imported by German immigrants, which is why it’s mostly made and eaten in and around Pennsylvania and parts of the mid-Atlantic region.)

Panhas and scrapple used to make use of the broth and pig parts left over after pig-butchering and sausage-making. The ingredients, preparation, and flavor place scrapple and Panhas (and their close cousin, the Dutch Balkenbrij) in the black pudding family.

Slice it, fry it up, serve it with eggs and bread. Now you, too, can eat like a 17th century Westphalian peasant!

Po-tay-toes

 

All right, the All Dressed potato chip flavor is pretty damn good. I stocked up in Canada, and today I saw that our local grocery store carries at least one brand variety of All Dressed as well. (For the uninitiated, of which I was one until recently, All Dressed is a combination of ketchup, BBQ, sour cream & onion, and salt & vinegar flavorings. It’s a little more tart and less sweet than your average BBQ chip.)

5/5, would (and will) binge again.

Social media stuff

After my long social media hiatus before the pandemic, I gradually reintruduced measured amounts of it back into my routine. I’ve had a new Instagram account for a few years now, and I post on Bluesky and Threads. Bluesky has become my favorite, and I am not thrilled with Meta’s policies, so I think I’ll throttle back my use of Threads and Insta and just stay active on Bluesky (I’m @markokloos.bsky.social).

As for the picture updates via Instagram—I suppose if I am going to create free content for anyone, it might as well be for my own site instead of Zuckerberg’s algorithm and pockets. It’s a good excuse to update the blog more frequently.

Andy A. Doodle

Scientifically proven to be the Goodest Boy.