[As usual, two weeks lag here, if you aren’t reading this on my Patreon (https://www.patreon.com/blazeward). If you’d like your news fresher, and the monthly Anti-Stodgy/Redneck Chef newsletter, all I ask is a buck to help keep the lights on around here.]
Monday, and I’m in the process of purging my mailing lists. (lovely typo there. “mailing lusts.” Don’t ask.)
Every newsletter accumulates people. They sign up and maybe stop reading. Or kill the email. Or were using their burner for some reason. Every couple of years, I purge. Using MailerLite, it is WAY easier than it used to be. I ask it for inactive people, then send a “Hey, YOU!” email to those folks. Anybody who responds drops off the inactive list immediately. Eventually, the rest go away.
Saves me money, because mailing lists cost cash monthly. Better this way.
If you got one, I’m not bluffing, but it’s nothing personal. Just business. Reply and you’re safe. (iPhone users usually, since it no longer allows tracking. But I know a LOT of nerds who are as computer security conscious as I am.)
Past that, life in general. Went north Saturday and picked up half a cow. 350 POUNDS of meat, offal, and bone. The coffin freezer is COMPLETELY full, as are both freezers in the houses. Worked out to something around $5/pound delivered, which is AMAZING for the quality and quantity we got. And we can do this because we have the lifestyle. And the tools. And the mindset.
Anti-Stodgy. Y’all give it a try.
Okay, writing news. Finished Knight Errant, the first Maddox Nevin story. Now that you have read Trial By Leviathan, you know sort of who Maddox is. After book 5 (Crossroads), he spins off for reasons we cover in that book. Different kind of story, with more Space Western flavor attached. Marrakesh was derived from Patrick O’Brian, and Napoleonic Era sailing. Wooden Ships and Iron Men, to quote the old saying (and the boardgame). The A’Zedi Survey Corps books let me go a different direction, while expanding the universe and forcing me to go deeper into history and stuff.
Gonna be fun. Not sure when it comes out, but the target is 2025, because 2024 is full already.
After that, I wrote the next Holden Barick story. Number Sixteen overall, split between Holden and Reilly primarily. Still having enormous fun with these, and eventually I will publish a book one of the Scattered Tribes Chronicle, but that’s like 200,000 words in a single spine. And Book One. Shit’s epic, yo!
After that, I started the next Beckett Fernsby story. For those of you that have read Gulliver’s Other Travels, you have now met Beckett. I’m almost done with story number five, and they will be in Boundary Shock Quarterly initially. Issues 025, 026, 027, 028, and 030. (029 is a First Contact story starring WarDog Charlie and His Eminence Daniel, the Duke of Los Angeles in Exile. Certain of you know the man. The rest can suffer in silence for a while.)
Not sure what I start next. Possibly the third (of four) Ollie novels, also targeted at release next year. Space Archaeology. And Gods, but only sort of. One of those open series I’m trying to complete. God knows I’ve got enough of them.
Considered the third Heather, but I gotta be in a kinda dark place for that, and I’m not. Rather cheery at the moment. Had a couple of amazingly good days last week and the weekend, and don’t feel like embracing mean to write Heather. And that’s the necessity.
Consider yourselves lucky.
Random question: I tend to end old series on a note where I could pick it up and extend it. If I was to go back and do so, which series of mine would be your vote? (Jessica doesn’t count. That Phil and then Heather.)
shade and sweet water,
blaze
West of the Mountains, WA
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