Wednesday, 18 December 2024

My reading in 2024

I do this every year, so you can step back for more than a decade should you so choose. Here's the link to 2023.

If I finish The Great When, by Alan Moore, before January 1st then I'll add it here and will have beaten my yearly record (since records began around 2011) with 17 books read!


I've linked my Goodreads review for each book from its mention below.

The standout read, among many 5* books, was The Daughters' War, by Christopher Buehlman.

I read the following books from SPFBO contestants (former and present):

In The Shadow Of Their Dying, by Michael R Fletcher & Anna Smith-Spark (Anna not in SPFBO).
Murder at Spindle Manor (SPFBO champion book), by Morgan Stang.
The Will of the Many, by James Islington.
The Bitter Crown, by Justin Lee Anderson (SPFBO champion author).
Blood Over Brighthaven, by M.L Wang (SPFBO champion author).
Sealed Empire, by Norbert Zsivicz.

My two highly literary reads were:

Little, Big, by John Crowley.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, by Haruki Murakami.

My non-fantasy reads were:

The Last House on Needless Streetby Catriona Ward  -- Horror
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, by Haruki Murakami. -- Literary Fiction.

My Self-published fantasy reads were:
Murder at Spindle Manor (SPFBO champion book), by Morgan Stang.
Sealed Empire, by Norbert Zsivicz.
Return to Edan, by Philip Chase.

Other fantasy reads:

Jade City, by Fonda Lee.
The Red Knight, by Miles Cameron.
Lord of a Shattered Land, by Howard Andrew Jones.
Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman.
The Daughters' War, by Christopher Buehlman.



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Monday, 16 December 2024

A Year In Numbers ... 14

At 14, this blog is now as old as Prince Jorg Ancrath when we met him in the opening pages of my debut novel!

Although I spent 23 years as a research scientist I never spent longer than 10 years at any one job, so I guess that makes "authoring" my longest employment.

Anyway, onto the traditional accounting:


It has been a very good 2024 all told!

I hope it's not tempting fate, but Celyn only went into hospital 4 times this year and I only spent one night sat up in a regular chair til breakfast of the next day. She did, sadly, start having seizures this year though, after a 12 year break where they were controlled. So, swings and roundabouts.

This post follows up from similar posts at the same time in 202320222021202020192018201720162015201420132012 and 2011 I record a year of ups and less ups. I take a minute to do the sums and raid the scrapbook.

I've now had my Patreon for more than 3 years and it has been great fun so far. The Discord is very active, and I've done a ton of critiques for the highest tier patrons.

Also - for tier 3+ people there are 7 of my unpublished books to download along with short stories and novellas!


The Book That Broke The World came out in 2024, and The Library Trilogy will conclude in April of 2025.    


In addition, I've published short stories associated with the trilogy. Three of them (Overdue & Returns (2 stories: Returns & About Pain) in ebook. And then a collection of those stories and one other (Tabula Rasa) that are available in Missing Pages as an ebook, paperback, or hardcover!

  
(cover art by Tom Brown (Trilogy art by Tom Roberts))


I also put out a collection of short stories for The Book of the Ancestor (ebook, paperback, and hardcover) and have put Road Brothers out in the US for the first time in paper form.

 
Tales of Abeth cover art by Francesca Resta who has done the art for the imminent Grim Oak Press Book of the Ancestor special edition omnibus! Road Brothers cover art by Pen Astridge.)

April 2025 sees the release of book 3, 


And if you were to pre-order it (US, UK), I would stand in your debt!


Lies, damn lies, and statistics to follow:

Goodreads continues to bug out in major ways every week but soldiers on. This year I reached the 5,000 limit on friends and have 200 requests pending - so if you try to friend me and nothing happens ... you're in a queue.


The blog is bumping along around 1,000 hits a day, but I think social media has reduced blogs to a shadow of what they were - we did reach 5 million visits in total (across the blog's history) in 2024, which is quite a milestones.


I'm still on Instagram. And have added Threads and Bluesky (which has really taken off) to the failing Pintrest and Tumblr (I'm easy enough to find on them and too lazy to put links). 

And finally, as ever, our favourite cesspit of witch hunts and fake news: Twitter, where I continue my crawl forward with an extra 2,500 followers this year, despite Mr Musk's continuing attempts to incinerate his 44 billion dollars. Should be noted that I lost about 900 followers in the post election exodus to Bluesky, where I gained about 3,200 followers in the same period.


Many thanks to all my readers for keeping me going! I hope you all have happy holidays and that 2025 is good to us all!




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7 unpublished books for $15!

 


On my Patreon, for those of tier 3 and higher there's a selection of my unpublished work along with free access to some that is otherwise for sale or only available in less readable formats.
This includes seven complete books:
The Bookshop Book
The Chinese Room
I, Hubert
Gunlaw
Blood of the Red
Darker Tide
Memory
You can sign up at tier 3 ($15) for a month and grab all 7 books along with short stories, novellas, and partially complete projects. And then bail. No problem.
Your feedback would be gratefully received too.



Sunday, 15 December 2024

Missing Pages

I've published a collection of short stories associated with The Library Trilogy!


It contains the stories previously published in ebook only (Overdue, Returns, & About Pain) plus a new story: Tabula Rasa.

The main selling points apart from the new story & Tom Brown's fabulous cover art, is that you can get the collection in paper - both in paperback and in hardcover.

You can get the cover art as prints from Tom:

A3: https://thomas-brown-1.sumupstore.com/product/overdue-a3-signed-print

A4: https://thomas-brown-1.sumupstore.com/product/overdue-a4-signed-print


Anyway - get Missing Pages from Amazon, I'm self-publishing it so it won't make it to bookstores.

Self-published books do cost a little more, but loads more of the money goes to the author ... so there's that! And you deserve it too 😃


US: https://www.amazon.com/Missing-Pages-collection-stories-associated/dp/B0DNZVSXG6

UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Missing-Pages-collection-stories-associated/dp/B0DNZVSXG6


Have a great Christmas, all!










Friday, 6 December 2024

Sales of my short stories

Here's one of my trademark wonderful graphics!

Most of the Broken Empire short stories are in Road Brothers. I think the exception are Solomon, Morality Tale, The Bigger Bastard, and Unholy Ghost.

The Red Queen's War stories are in Road Brothers, The Devil You Know collection (A Thousand Years & The Hero of Aral Pass, & The New World).

The Book of the Ancestor short stories are in Tales of Abeth (Bound, The Devil You Know, Thaw)

& The Library Trilogy stories are in Missing Pages (Overdue, Returns, About Pain, Tabula Rasa).