Dave Walsh's Blog, page 2
June 16, 2023
Trailer for Babylon 5: The Road Home
If you’ve been following me for a while now, you know Babylon 5 is one of my favorite shows and the talk of a possible B5 reboot has been percolating for years now, with plenty of false starts. So, consider my surprise to finding out about this project.
JMS announced something was coming in April, then I suppose formerly announced this in May, but considering how the world has been going, I hadn’t been paying attention. So when this dropped, well, it was a pleasant surprise.
This releases on August 15th.
June 8, 2023
Book Review: Indigo Voss by K. Leigh
Posting that review yesterday reminded me I read this incredible book last month and posted a review for it, and that said review should be on here as well. So, here’s another indie book you should absolutely 100% be reading.
There’s something about the way this book opens that punches you in the gut right away. The care and attention given to each scene in visceral detail reaches out and refuses to let you go, which isn’t something most books can accomplish.
If this book is anything, it’s dripping with intent. Don’t be afraid of the heady messages and themes that are buried in here about trauma, love, self-worth and how people who are different are forced to navigate a world that often makes no sense to them.
If you know Alex from the Constellis Voss books, it helps, but you don’t need to have read the previous books to be immersed. Alex is a complicated character who just wants the surrounding people to be happy after growing up a subject of abuse, neglect and forced into a life of sex trafficking and crime. Alex’s struggle with identity is never internal, it’s almost always external. While Alex understands he’s a boy, it’s everyone else insisting on treating him differently, be it like a girl or placating him by calling him a boy, but treating him differently.
When Alex can finally make friends is when things get complicated. At that point, Alex has already morphed into an assassin, hell bent on destroying his captor and boss, Boris, and is convinced not just that he’s a bad person, but an irredeemable villain that doesn’t deserve love and affection. While love is a central theme, don’t confuse it with romance. There is some romantic love at parts of Alex’s life, but it all gets jumbled up in his head while he’s fighting his fracture psyche and trying to literally push Boris’s deadly bullet leveled at him out of his head and prevent his own death.
Most of the book is Alex experiencing and fighting for these memories. The ones he doesn’t want seem to be the strongest, while the ones he wants to hold on to and cherish are the ones being wiped out by the bullet that’s coursing through his mind. Because there are always those people in life that want to control, to take all the accumulated good and block it out to maintain that control. Whether Alex realizes it or not, Alex isn’t the villain, nor is he only the summation of the things he was forced to do (mainly fuck and kill), but is a person with a lot to give and built up a community of people initially to help reach his end goal of destroying Boris, only for that to become something much more.
The book’s climax was masterfully built to, and not at all expected. Because this isn’t a story about revenge, fucking and killing. It’s a book about finding the people who love you, accept you for who you are and will accept all the messy bits that come with these relationships.
Getting to know, and I mean really know, some of these characters is also a treat, and helps add more context to the other books. Getting to see prime Alex interacting with all of them and forging these bonds that will carry forth into the future is really something.
You can pick up Indigo Voss right now in both ebook and paperback format.
You really should do that, by the way.
June 7, 2023
Book Review: Letters from a Shipwreck in the Sea of Suns and Moons by Raymond St. Elmo
This book came to me as a recommendation from author MH Thaung and was genuinely something I’d probably never encounter on my own digging at the library or elsewhere. I’m glad I found this book, though. I get the feeling I’m gonna dig into more of Raymond St. Elmo’s work sometime soon, which is a good thing.
There were occasions throughout this book where I felt perhaps things were lagging a bit, or the pacing could be tightened up and I worried it would lose me. I stuck with it, though, and am glad that I did.
A poet runs away from his girlfriend’s uber-conservative family who disapproves of them being together, going on one of those wind-swept, oft-romanticized quests to either find himself or lose himself to the ocean in one last poetic act. Both things happen and also probably don’t, although that’s complicated.
The story weaves in ancient gods, a playful tone and a lot of surreal elements together into a majestic tapestry of words that are hard not to get lost in. The lost island of Theodosia, existing or not, is hardly the issue at hand, mind you. It’s about a lost tome half-translated into French by a mad sea captain and that book being lost at sea during a wreck.
This story unfolds as an interview exchange between a researcher and the old, blind sailor-poet, although there’s far more to that than is originally let on to. We delve into some oddly prescient stuff about technology, sentience and re-writing history to feel better about things. You could even say there’s something that could appeal to us right now, amid debates over the burgeoning AI tech that we’re being inundated with. Or, perhaps, simply the voices and characters we craft in our own heads to get through the day are the culprit here. Regardless of intent, there’s room to work and explore, which is appreciated.
In a way, we’re all the researcher, and we just want Mr. St. Elmo, wielding his St. Elmo’s Fire from his fist, to get Miss K and a happy ending, just like we are always wanting “more” from the world, never sated.
Really fantastic book. Very rarely am I reading an indie book where I feel like I’m being challenged or not being hit with constant hits of serotonin to get me to buy another book. This is really what indie books should be more like. Daring, odd, and willing to explore the in between places. My only misgiving is I wish it was available on more platforms than just Kindle.
So, if you want to pick this one up, you’re going to have to deal with the Almighty (and awful) Zon. It’s worth it, though.
June 2, 2023
6.1.23 – Back Away, Banana Breath
Season three of Tim Robinson’s I Think You Should Leave dropped on Netflix and it’s so damned good.
If you don’t know the series, it’s a sketch comedy series on Netflix that is built on the simple premise where every sketch builds to the point where someone is on the verge of being told to leave. It’s a simple, ridiculous premise and it’s some of the best comedy in this format in ages.
It’s almost impossible to describe the comedy style and how most of it revolves around Tim’s facial expressions, shouting and ridiculous situations, but it’s… yeah.
The kids have been off from school for about a week now and hoo boy, Summer Vacation.
May 12, 2023
5.12.23 – On Hiking and Tears of the Kingdom
I’ve been relatively quiet these last few weeks while I return to one of my WIPs I’ve lovingly just labeled “the bomb book.”
My wife and I have started to go on [mostly] daily hikes these last two weeks and it’s been really nice. I’m not the type of person who’s ever really been super excited about the idea of hiking, and coming from the Northeast, I’m not a big outdoors person. I’ve always liked the ocean, mostly because that’s where I grew up and the ocean was always close enough to just visit in some downtime. Out here? Not really. We’ve got mountains, rocks, dirt, cacti and, well, you get it.
But, it’s been surprisingly nice.
It looks like we’re gonna go on another one here soon enough.
On top of that, I’ve been playing the new Zelda game this week (don’t ask), and it’s one helluva experience. As someone who liked Breath of the Wild considerably, but ran out of steam after a few temples, this game feels different and more “complete.”
Speaking of complete, you know my Trystero series is complete, right? And you can buy all of ’em?
The Trystero Collection: Books 4-6 $13.99 Add to cart 
The Trystero Collection: Books 1 – 3 (eBook) $9.99 Add to cart 
Broken Ascension (Paperback) $12.99 Add to cart
April 29, 2023
Short Fiction
Here’s where you can find my various short fiction that’s been published. If you join my Patreon you’ll gain access to my monthly short stories archive and more.
Bright Future (Everyday Fiction)
The Princess in the Distant Castle (A Flash of Words)
4.29.23 – Bookshop Free Shipping Sale
The big thing about being a writer is that you should, in theory, like to read books. I’m not gonna rant about how there are plenty of “authors” out in the wild that don’t seem to care about the artistry or even basic craft in lieu of business. Because I’d go on and on and on and on and… ah shit, sorry.
Anyway.
Bookshop is running a sale for Independent Bookstore Day and if you haven’t gotten out to your local independent bookstore this weekend, just can’t, or don’t have one, no sweat. Your purchases from Bookshop help raise money for local bookstores (or dorks like me), which is pretty rad. This sale means no shipping costs. Let’s be real, one of the allures of Big River is paying a flat rate for shipping up front and then getting “Free PRIME” shipping all year, on top of other perks. Considering Big River doesn’t seem to care about losing money as long as shareholder value increases, nobody can really compete with that.
Bookshop runs sales like this sparingly, so if you’ve been waiting to make a purchase of a book you can’t find locally or just don’t want to buy from Amazon, now’s a great time to do so.
Look, I’m not gonna tell you what to buy, but if that so happens to include expanding on your library of d.w. novels, I’m not gonna tell you not to. In fact, you should. You can find those books here.
In addition, I’ve got a list of some of my favorite books on there as well.
Just today I went ahead and bought a few books I read over the last few years (libraries!) and want on my shelf forever.
That includes the following:
Desert Creatures by Kay Chronister. You can check out my five-star review of it on BookBub.
Velvet Was the Night by Silvia Moreno Garcia. The author of Mexican Gothic reinvents herself constantly, and this taut neo-noir about the Mexican Dirty War is tremendous.
Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor. This is a difficult, angry book about a lot of things that I can’t recommend enough. For me, it’s a must-own. Read my five-star review.
April 26, 2023
4.26.23: On Routines and Breaking Things
When it comes to sharing my thoughts and whatever I’ve been up to, I’m not usually super into it. Part of the reason is that days blend together.
Every morning I make the same breakfast; 75grams of protein pancake mix with water, 1 serving of butter and 1/4th serving of syrup (have you seen how much syrup they think is a serving?!), put on a pot of coffee and have somewhere in the realm of two large cups, or four normal-sized cups with some oat milk creamer. All of this is about 550 calories.
I do this every day. It’s not because I’m boring (maybe I am, I don’t know), but because I like these things. It keeps me full until the late afternoon, gives me enough energy to get through my day and get stuff done, and you know, I’m not miserable eating it like I can be with other stuff that’s full of protein, good fat and not overflowing with calories and sugar.
On top of this, most of my days revolve around writing and my kids.
My wife said goodbye at 6:30 while she headed off for work, informing me of the litany of things she got started and I have to finish. My alarm went off at 6:41 and Kid 2 asked for chocolate milk (he does this every day). Kid 1 said he needed nothing. Looked up the school lunch and Kid 1 likes hot dogs, Kid 2 wanted me to make him a lunch today. So, I made them lunches, made sure their bags were packed, they got clothes on, found their shoes (grumble), got them into the car, dropped off at school and I came home to where I started breakfast and watering the backyard and various plants.
Exciting, right?
I’m working on a novel I shelved last year and came back to with at least a hopefully clearer mind. The other night before bed, I had this really amazing idea for a new opening page and had to write it, which pushed me to realize I needed to rework a ton of it. So, a complete draft of a book at 76,000 words has turned into a salvage project where I’m writing new passages and taking the good parts from the previous draft. In just a few days, I’m back at 22,000 words and hopefully I’m able to move pretty quickly through this, as I have a much better idea of what this book should be now.
April 11, 2023
4.11.23: Technology Sucks
Today was an unusually kinda crummy day. It was pretty warm out, so I decided working outside would be in order. If you aren’t aware of how I work, I don’t use a laptop or anything fancy anymore to write away from my PC; I use an ancient AlphaSmart Neo 2 I snatched on eBay in 2019 for about $30, before the price got out of control for them in 2020 for… well, reasons, you know? In part, it was the Freewrite devices getting popular and them having a wild $500+ price tag for what’s essentially a word processor but with modern tech in it.
This little $30 thing has yet to fail me until today when it had a meltdown. It’s also not the device’s fault, somehow. There’s a backup battery inside of the Neo 2, something I did not know about. It’s a CR2032, for those that know electronics and know that’s a pretty bog standard watch and motherboard battery. Believe it or not, I still have two of ‘em in the package in my junk drawer.
Score.
The Neo 2 was also a device they didn’t want you to repair yourself, so it uses three different screws. The message when I booted it up asked if I changed the backup battery, and if you didn’t, send it back to Renaissance Learning for repair. A company that doesn’t deal with AlphaSmart devices anymore. Granted, even if it did, I wouldn’t send this back. I’m pretty handy with electronics and computers, so I busted out my bit driver and sure enough, I had all three bits.
If you feel like this is going far too well, you’re getting the vibes here. I cracked it open, replaced the old backup battery and was incredibly careful to not displace the regular batteries. You see, if you don’t pop them out, you can avoid losing your data as long as either the backup or primary batteries are still in play.
Everything went off without a hitch. Then I came to the last screw. Of course, it was difficult and didn’t want to go in. I ever so carefully tilted the device to get a better angle on the screw and sure enough, those three AA batteries spilled out because this device was the kind that didn’t have battery guides in place, just a slot for three batteries to stack onto each other with only the screwed-on battery cover to keep them from moving around.
Damnit.
I booted it up and sure enough, data corruption. Just after I’d gotten back into my work-in-progress and had some good stuff down. A whole day’s work was completely gone.
Anyway, I went ahead and factory reset the Neo 2 and it’s working like it should, but damn if I’m not upset about losing that stuff today. After this, I made the call to sit down, try to relax and play Advance Wars: Dual Strike on my newly hacked 3DS.
… it wouldn’t boot. See how this is going? Yeah.
Don’t worry, I got it to work, but oof, not my day.
April 1, 2023
Check Out This Awesome Indie Book Sale
Greetings all and happy April. No, not April Fool’s, okay? Here’s an awesome indie book sale going on right now featuring a ton of sci-fi and fantasy books, including books from SPSFC and SPFBO.
This sale is only from April 1st until April 3rd, so get it while you can here.
Happy #IndieApril all.
Click Here for the Mega Sale
