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[As usual, three 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.]

Occasionally, shit gets weird. And I mean by my standards. Coloring FAR outside the lines y’all folks are used to.

I am, however, both a professionally trained philosopher and a professional writer, so I have learned to roll with it.

Yesterday, the usual Monday morning DND game got canceled when the GM got held over at the fire station. (Usually, he gets off shift at 6am, but obviously someone called off sick and he was there until noon.) Had that message when I crawled out of bed at 7, but decided to keep my Monday as close to normal as possible anyway.

Went down and got breakfast as usual.

Went over for coffee and sat to write for an hour. As usual. Essay for an upcoming anthology where I got to guest-edit.

The usual would be to hit the bookstore when it opened and game. Instead, I had brought stuff with me to work on the tabletop game I’m designing, spreading my shit out all over the table and making notes here and there on a lot of papers.

Game is coming together nicely. Couple of playtests that revealed problems with the economic system. Changes yesterday made things flow faster (I think) and easier. Probably recruit a group and run a test at some point. Need to collect tokens and shit, but that’s easy enough.

But on the drive south, I had a nagging pain in my kidneys that turned out to be a new character poking me to get my attention.

You folks know me. I like playing (and writing) against type, because after 45 years of DND, I have played all the basic configurations of characters at least three times.

Same in the writing. Normal characters are boring, which is why so many writers invent Chosen Ones™ to have destiny thrust upon them with all of the Tolkien/Rowling bullshit thrown into the gumbo.

</Yawn>

But there was a meme I saved years ago about playing against type. Or casting against type. It was for Star Trek: Next Gen era. (Gotta be specific because the amount of time from Captain James T. Kirk (TOS, 2266 CE) to Captain Nahla Ake (Academy, 3195 CE) is only slightly shorter than the period between today and when William the Conqueror died in 1086.)

The Meme talked about playing against type. A Betazed Weapons Officer who was hungry to kick ass. A Klingon counselor who understood that mental health was just as much an honorable battle as anything in an arena. That sort of thing.

Driving, that little voice quoted the old saying, “It is better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war.” He’s not Klingon, but they would adopt the guy. Broken. Recovering from naval service (and I know a lot of veterans that came out broken and more than a little crazy) by working in his garden. Embodying the warrior in a garden ethos.

Then somebody shows up to ruin his day. And recruit him back to active duty, helping someone else that needs it. Someone who has been there, and can understand. Someone who has a personal connection that will make things both easier and harder.

Putting it into a space adventure setting, because that’s me. It could just as easily be private detective fiction or anything else, because it will be a story about relationships and recovery. Burnout that doesn’t kill you. It merely makes you shift to doing the job on paper and nothing more.

We’ve all worked there. You want to make a difference and make things better. Eventually, most institutions grind you down and you are just there for the paycheck. HR is not your friend. They work for the bosses as boot lickers protecting the corporation from being culpable for how they treat employees.

Eventually, you are just treading water and don’t give a fuck.

We’ve all worked there.

That’s the sign you need a new job. A new employer. A new career. A new industry.

Something.

I was lucky enough to skip across several industries in my computer days, from property management to paratransit to health to legal claims settlement.

Every corporation reaches a certain mass and metastasizes into a beast that consumes lives and spits out profit.

And you can’t quit the navy. Not really. You can serve out your time and get honorably discharged if you want benefits later. Or lose your mind and get tossed into the corner like a broken doll. Known a few folks who danced that line. And were broken civilians.

So I wrote a story yesterday. Out of the blue. New universe, new setting, new everything. Literally writing story, then switching files to record details as they emerged from the subconscious. It’s short. You’ll probably get it June 1. Might be more of them, because Mick has opinions and will give us a really different take on the classical (semi-)military space adventure.

You have been warned.

🙂

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

It’s misting almost heavy enough to be called drizzle.

I moved to Seattle for the rain, so this puts a smile on my face. Especially after my weekend.

Saturday night about 5pm, the alarm on the septic systems went off. Loud buzzing that took me a bit to sort out. Then outside and find the shutoff for the siren.

Then inside and onto the internet, researching why septic alarms go off. Lots of reasons, some benign, like the tank got too much water suddenly and couldn’t pump fast enough. Others involve failures of components.

Did what I could, waited until Sunday to see if a couple of them worked. Nothing.

Called my septic folks and left a vmail.

They open at 730 on weekdays. She called me at 740. Was actually headed to breakfast, so turned around and called her when I got home. She walked me through various checks, then determined that the pump might have died.

Lemme tell you, yuck.

Head back south, waiting for the estimate.

Fabulous Publisher Babe™ calls me a couple of hours later because the tanks are making strange noises.

At some point, as part of the phone call, I had left the pump on manual. After a delay long enough for me to get gone, it had run. And pumped the secondary tank DRY. Didn’t know that at the time.

Got the estimate, which included $1800 to pump that tank empty, plus $2200 for a new pump.

Yuck.

Cut my day off and headed to Home Depot and rented a pump, all set to save myself a shitton of cash. Got home with it and that’s when I realized the pump was working. Called the Septic folks and she walked me through a full visual inspection, taking notes for her guys. Still needs something, but not an expensive pump replacement, so I turn around and take the pump back, having had it for an hour and a half, with most of that being driving.

Guys arrived here at 735 this morning. Local, but damned local, if they set out at 730.

Quick inspection, since they have most of the notes already. Float had died, so they put in a new one and I’ll get a much smaller bill sometime after they write it up. Plus a formal inspection at some point this summer. Dunno about pumping the main tank. Gotta do that every once in a while as it fills with sludge.

The guys were gone by 805. Not on site thirty minutes to replace a float and go.

There is a reason I love my septic company. Cheerful and stone pros.

But yesterday took a lot of spoons out of me and today the rains are putting them slowly back.

I did finish Kincaide 3 over the weekend. 185k. Rougher than most, but that’s taking four months, so I am certain I have details wrong in places and need to fix. Putting it aside for a bit and will deal with it later.

May is probably short fiction month. Need more Zach and Redlance stories. Writing Beckett 9 now. Brain had a good start on Derlyth 4, which is novel. Charlotte 2 and 3. Couple of others.

No idea what the next of several possible major projects I’ll go after. If you have a need, give a yell and maybe inspire me. Or at least lean me.

Slow day. Possibly slow month. Unlikely to crack writing ten novel projects this year, and that’s fine. Maybe a bunch of novellas instead. Last Stand 13 is coming in July. Need to write more of those. And other things.

Right now, I just need rain.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Tuesday. Coffee on deck. Lots of coffee.

Had a bear Sunday night. (actually about 1am Monday morning, but, you know.) Trying to get into the compost bin and bashing it with a paw. Black bears around here. Either just woken up and hungry, or just kicked out on his own and looking for territory. And I’m surrounded by green immediately and rednecks beyond that, so they don’t stay.

But him, bashing on the drum. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Jump up, run to the other end of the house and smack on a window right over his head. Blur hauling ass for the far end of the yard as I get round to the door and turn on the outside light. Give him a ten count before opening the door to yell.

Get them every year. Either into the trash cans, the compost rollers, or my wife’s bird feeders. Got lucky here, because the rollers are 30” tubes and you have to slide the hatch sideways. Everything black, slider green. Always wondered if bears are color-blind green not to see that. Only ever had one actually open it.

Writing: Good news: Kincaide is at 168k this morning before I start. Bad News: It’s gonna be longer than expected. Probably 200, so not done this week as expected.

Shit happens. Also have several other stories in motion on the phone. Harri 3. Derlyth 4. Plus short stuff I’ve been banging out regularly.

And you’ll have to wait until the Anti-Stodgy news to hear about my night last night. It was a little weird, but perfectly in line with my life these days. And none of it was my fault. Always good to clarify.

Probably need to go make more coffee. One cup isn’t even cutting the gunk in my head at the moment. But things are really a lot better these days than they were. Did a martial arts seminar these last two Friday nights down in Tacoma. Khmer art called Bokatar. The Sensei was really expert and a good teacher. Learned a couple of excellent nuggets, but you reach a point where there are only so many ways to move a human body, so it comes down to who focuses on what. His was a couple of shifts over from what I do these days. Lots of the underlying mechanics were the same, just in different sequence.

But you always have to keep learning, because as soon as you stop going uphill, you start going downhill. Eventually you end up in a recliner watching TV and turning to mush. Not for me.

Past that, more Kincaide. Done as soon as he lets me go, but likely at least another week of his craziness. Then on to SOMETHING else. Dunno what yet. This has been the heavy emotional lifting all year, and I’m not looking beyond it until it’s done.

But it’s coming.

Yay.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Tuesday. Late April. Kincaide is sitting at 1533k at this point, that slow grind because I want this to read slow so I have to take my time writing it.

Meanwhile, other projects flow in the background. Third Harri is started. Fourth Derylth (No, I have no idea why) popped up over the weekend and I’m a good chunk into it on the phone.

Humor generally better, but largely ignoring the interwebs today. Too many people in foul moods swinging live cats around. (Dead cats don’t lead with claws out.)

Too many other people asking why we can’t just get along, when there are some hurtful, malicious folks out there, pretending to be ignorant.

I always tell folks that they can push me backwards off the table, but lots of ijits don’t grasp that. Until it’s too late, anyway.

I will argue with you in good faith, if I think I can convince you and get you to change your mind. At some point however, recalcitrance sets in and mules digs hooves. Start swinging live cats. Or edges weapons.

I won’t stay around if I expect you to slam a [metaphorical, usually] knife into my kidneys when I’m not looking. And hurt dogs howl, so I listen to the words that come out of folks mouths when they get angry.

In vino, veritas works just as well for rage. Folks forget which set of lies they’ve been speaking and the truth comes out.

The truth always comes out.

But I won’t fight you at that point. Won’t raise my voice.

Will walk. Won’t look back.

Couple of folks out there won’t even notice I left, but they don’t know me at all. Just happened to be folks I previously found interesting, until I happened to be in the room when they went off on a rampage. Racist. Sexist. Homophobic. Don’t really care why you decided to show your whole ass to the internet.

Am paying attention. Don’t have time for your bullshit or your swinging blades.

Because you are supposed to be an adult. So either you aren’t, or this is what you think is acceptable behavior.

No. But thank you for playing. And best of luck at whatever. I’ll be off enjoying myself someplace that doesn’t involved children like you throwing tantrums.

The rest of you might draw lessons from my experiences. Might remember folks that you haven’t seen in a while and suspect that they found your behavior questionable.

How are you working to make yourself a better person?

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Yesterday was 413.

I keep certain folks in my phone with reminders of birthdays, even after I lose them. Yesterday would have been Perry’s 64^th birthday.

There was a 14-month stretch in 2008-9 where I lost three of my closest friends. Sean vanished entirely one day in late spring. Emails returned box full and phone disconnects. Dunno if he died, got vanished into a Mexican prison or something, or simply walked away from everyone and everything. Donna (first wife) died of breast cancer in June. (Original diagnosis in 2005 was Stage 4 ad six months, but she was stubborn and had things to do before she quit. Lasted almost exactly three years.)

Then Perry died.

He’d moved from Seattle back to Atlanta several years earlier, chasing a dream. It being the early email days, we stayed in touch, though long-distance bills were still a thing, as were charges for texting. Mostly email. For many years.

Winter 2007-08, Donna decided that she wanted to be married again (this after threatening to walk away immediately if I even mentioned the topic to her previously), and planned it for June. Small ceremony. Her kids, husbands, and grands. Only “outsiders” where her Maid of Honor, who she had known forever, and Perry, who I flew up special, then handed him the keys to my truck afterwards so he could spend a week seeing everyone he’d missed.

Then he went home and life settled into whatever the new normal would be, when I lost Donna in July, after 21 days of being married. Good friends kept me mostly sane. Got through the fall. Into the winter. Into 2009.

Then one day, I got a call.

(long pause. Heavy breaths.)

I’d been trying to get hold of Perry, but never got answers when I called (normal, if he was working) and he didn’t call back.

Two weeks pass, and he calls.

“Where the hell have you been?” I ask, seeing his number come up. (He occasionally had to vanish related to former government work and consulting, or so the story went).

“Is this Blaze?” she asked.

Well, fuck. Knew instantly.

He’d been at church on a Wednesday, cooking for the congregation, because he was a trained chef among all the other things he did. Hadn’t been feeling well, so he sat down, and died in his pastor’s arms of a massive, sudden heart attack.

Gone, just like that. At least I got to bring him back to Seattle for that one last trip. And to see him.

His sister made arrangements and flew out to Seattle in the fall, where we had a wake for him at our favorite restaurant. Only a few of the folks knew him, but they’d all heard me talk about Perry. And been with me through Sean disappearing on all of us, then me losing Donna.

It’s been 18 years. Still choke up, because three close friends all gone too soon, back to back to back. Remember to hug people. Lots.

Remember that this might be the last time you ever see them. And that you will miss them a lot, especially when their birthday reminder comes up. (Donna’s is in November)

Yesterday would have been his birthday. And I miss him.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Better this week. Granted, low bar considering last week, but better. Absolutely nobody got bit last week. Close doesn’t count.

Still crunchy this morning, but that’s Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and today working in the yard and expanding one of the orchard boxes. Spent this morning on the phone with English Paul while finishing off the rabbit wire and such to keep the large ungulates at bay. They’re polite enough. Scared one while walking around because I wasn’t paying attention and she popped up from her nap about ten feet in front of me, ambling off.

But they eat things. Gotta box them off. Got space to plant a lot of new things that are currently in pots. But crunchy.

Last night at the dojo, we put on gloves and hammered each other. Best way to learn to take a punch is to take a punch. Got a small bruise on my cheek where Josh jabbed instead of hooking and got inside my guard, but otherwise good. Just ate lunch so I could take some advil. Gonna need that.

Talking to Paul while working, we covered Sebelius, Chopin, and Purcell. Because public domain music can be adapted and arranged, and we’re looking at how old revolutionary tunes (Finlandia, in one case) and be a call to arms in a new punk rock project. And how a rondo can turn into a walking bass line when tweaked. No idea if it will work, but I have a sound palate now and thoughts on revolutionary lyrics.

Some of you will remember Owen Castle, who has appeared in a couple of Boundary Shock Quarterly stories. Another one coming this fall. Those are all set in a bleak dystopian future where the world is running down and the revolution is coming. And going to be ugly, because if you stop things from naturally moving, the pressures build up until they erupt instead of oozing.

Owen looks around at his friends and suggests that, “It’s almost midnight, Cinderella.” as a way of summing things up. That’s where I’m writing parts of what could technically be classified as a rock opera. Technically correct is best correct, after all.

Dunno. The music works different parts of my brain, and I can actually arrange things a little these days, though I am still shit at any instrument besides voice. That’s what I got him for, because he plays everything. And bought himself first a clarinet and then an alto sax in the last couple of months, after teaching himself violin last year.

He can probably play it, but we have a deal that I won’t play anything live unless its ‘Top of the Pops’ calling and I have to throw together a live band on short notice. Fortunately, he and I know a couple of orchestras worth of rock’n’rollers who’d come out to play.

Working on other projects on the side. Headed to NorWesCon this weekend, so I started a new Business For Breakfast book on designing and building your Stock Light Freighter for space adventure stories. All the tech and aesthetics you need to think about, so that your ship is its own character, and not just a gray box. Also working on space opera space military uniforms, so these two might be part of some new series of research guides or something.

They’ve filled me with a lot of new ideas that I hadn’t really considered previously, so already successful. Probably do the same for other writers. Worth the time. Like music, keep the brain sharp because I have to yell at Paul to stop edging over into comfortable, safe, and stodgy.

Kincaide 3 is around 117,000 words at this point. On track to 175+/-. Wrapping up lots and lots of grand things while exploring some of the questions present on page 1 if you know what to look for. Got several other novel projects when I get it done, but that’s May and why I am working on some of the other things at the same time.

Getting there slowly, but as I reminded Paul, the fact that I crossed 12,000,000 word written was a testament to me wanting it more than most folks. You know the ones. Cafe dilettantes, who have been working on their novel for the last ten years. Or complaining about how they just don’t have time to write, then spend hours talking about the latest game they’re playing. Or the show they’ve been binging.

What do you want out of life? Go look at what you are spending your time on.

Don’t like it?

Change.

Simple as that.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Ow.

Had a long phone call yesterday, so walked a big square around Enumclaw. From the bookstore north to the edge of town, then east to the dog park, then south to the highway, then all the way back to the bookstore. Map suggests about a four mile walk. Developed a fun blister between the ball and pad of my second toe, so took off my shoes and sat with my feet flat on the cold concrete for the second half of the call. Still limped all night. Mostly gone today, but…

Then dojo. Senior most student tested up from her black belt to black and red. As second senior student, I got to be her sparring dummy with staves. (Bo, for those of you being pedantic.)

She accidentally cracked me twice across the back of my right hand, nailing first two fingers with stingers. Ow.

After dojo, went to a local place to chat with Sensei and asked the waitress for a bag of ice to put on my hand for an hour. Helped with swelling and pain, to only double left hand.

Came home and took various things.

Crunchy this morning. Tired. Exhausted and drained. Life kinda sucks, but it will get better in another 4-6 weeks. Just gotta grind it out at this point.

Passed 100k on Kincaide yesterday. Deep into the final movement and how all the various parts will play out to get across that finish line.

Did a publishing review yesterday. Heather and Ollie through October. A’Zedi Survey Corp in Nov. Then probably RAN Stormhawk and Daughter of the Shogun for three months. Harri the Merchant (two done, planning one or two more this summer) in the spring, then Kincaide 3 to finish things off and we might be through June at this moment.

Reviewed Last Stand for Season Two. Got book 13 done and coming in a future issue of Boundary Shock Quarterly. Season Two is a whole long story arc that I have roughly planned out, so just need to write them. And more of this and that.

Emotionally, have to get through Kincaide first. Lot of heavy lifting there. Then all the other heavy emotional lifting around here, where painting with Molotov cocktails is (probably) not appropriate, but has made my top five list.

Frustrated and depressed. Folks are starting to see that I’m not shy and retiring under the smile, but generally incandescent. Trying not to bite anyone. Mostly succeeding.

Got a great new recipe for you next month. Made it over the weekend and enjoying.

Figure Kincaide gets done around May 1, then I can move forward.

Will try not to set fire to everything before then.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

It snowed Thursday night. And all day Friday. Part of Saturday.

Lost power at 9am Fri. Came back on Sat at 1130.

Wet, heavy stuff. Walk down the long driveway with the machete, knocking snow off trees that had been bent over under the weight. Had to use the Sawzall a few times where they had broken off and blocked the driveway. Did that three times.

Crap finally melted off Sunday afternoon. Down to a reasonable amount of snow in the yard this morning.

Only useful part of a day without power is that I can throw a log on the fireplace and keep the place warm, then sit on the couch and read, because I designed the house with lots of good lighting. In this case, I grabbed a clipboard and started taking notes.

I had been working on a worldbuilding project for the old SFF genre called Planetary Romance, more recently called Swords and Planets. SF, sure, but a lot more in the vein of Swords and Sorcery fantasy, usually with some sort of magic involved. Witch doctors or whatever. (Not to be confused with the Romance Genre, as the title actually predates that getting its own category in many places, and deals mostly with chaste, courtly romances of the swashbuckler ilk.)

Don’t wanna run down my batteries on my phones, so pen and paper. Around ten pages of notes by the time I’m done, and that doesn’t count stuff I copied directly from TV Tropes in order to have trope and theme stuff immediately handy.

Told Rebecca that I blame her for everything, because she was talking about some anthology series projects for next year, and Planetary Romance was one of them.

Yesterday being Monday, and a mostly normal one, I was down in town, and writing on that phone. Started with a bang, as I do, and am stealing a number of bones from a fairly prominent SF franchise, though you’ll only recognize the bones that THAT writer stole them from previously. There is nothing NEW, only a different way of presenting it. He stole it from a guy who stole it from another guy, so I don’t feel bad stealing it from him in turn. He’s not using it anymore anyway.

Got some 2500 words done. Need to circle back to Rebecca and get a word count from her, because it’s going to be another ongoing serial, but I don’t know if 10k or 20k chunks. Got probably 9 novels worth of ideas here, but that’s me able to mine three entire GENRES of story ideas spanning more than a century of silliness.

Past that, things are getting back to normal around here. Mostly. February sucked. March is behaving better, not counting winter storms dumping some 12-16 inches of snow that melted pretty quickly.

Kincaide 3 is about 85k, but still rumbling along slowly. Partly, that’s taking three days entirely off because I didn’t want to have the laptop on with no power. Will catch up. And keep rolling. Got stuff already done and ready for a full year of publishing dates from today, and that’s before I go deep into the trunk for more.

Y’all have a normal Tuesday, m’kay?

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Tuesdays traditionally were the days when TradPub released new books. Every author got a specific Tuesday assigned to them over the course of the year and that was the day their book would come out. I knew it unconsciously before I learned the details, because I just KNEW to walk into the bookstore in early April and I would find a new David Drake book.

These days, I always release on the 10^th. Today is the 10^th. I released a book.

Ollie 1 is finally out. Seeking The Gods, first in the Quest For The Ancients series. Xenoarchaeology and asking who built the ancient network of hypergates that connects the entire galaxy. More importantly, Ollie has never been able to locate the world where Humans come from, and that has irritated him for twenty years.

Then he discovers a clue. And shit will get way out of hand before we’re done, because I wanted to ask some big and chewy questions with this series.

It started out as a series of shorts, as you’ve seen me do several times since. Then I hit a “what the hell do I do now?” part and had to put one story aside for six months before the whole rest of everything came into focus and I wrote. And wrote.

Rufus has been one of my favoritest characters to write, because he’s alien. And does alien shit. Has alien observations and opinions, like how humans cannot commit science or read important books without touching them, regardless of not having eyes on their fingertips.

But the Troida made good evolutionary choices, which he will also remind you of regularly.

And Hawk, when you meet him, should have been played by a young John Astin. You’ll see it when you get there. I had too much fun.

It was a fun series. Dunno what I might write for Ollie in the future, or if I skip forward a generation to Ollie and Mani’s kid. Anything is possible, because I left a lot of open space on that map to play.

Red Branch 5 is getting a cover and a publication date. Doing edits on the back parts of both Heather and Ollie so those are ready in the summer and fall.

Deep into Kincaide’s War 3 at this point. Hit 70k of an expected 170k, and the last third came sharply into focus yesterday. USUALLY, I know how a book and series will end. Not here. Not until yesterday. I was just writing and trusting the unconscious parts of writer-brain to have it.

Granted, I have a whole series of questions that needed to be answered, left over from the first two books, so I knew many of those set pieces, but how they all came together wasn’t something I had consciously engaged.

Wow. Gonna be fun. Gonna be weird as hell, but fun. Just gotta get there.

Ollie today. Heather in a month. Rotating back and forth all summer and fall, then stuff at the end of the year that’s written and in the editing process.

I always knew that Kincaide 3 would be huge, in terms of time, because I expected it to take me 3+ months to write, given other projects and constraints. Shit happens, and this gets Kincaide off my plate for good. No longer hanging over my head to complete, so I can attack some of my other open projects, like Giles or Holden. Or Duff. Stuff to do. Fun to have.

Shit to write.

And more coffee this morning. Gotta have more coffee, as the bags under my eyes have zip codes.

Y’all find someone else to post bail instead.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

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If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.

[As usual, three 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.]

Grumpy, crunchy, and a little rabid this morning.

Dojo work last night was all take downs and falls. On mats, but a lot of middle-aged dudes learning basics from the lock to the drop. At one point, as practice dummy, Sensei tweaked my bad shoulder just enough that I’m on some asprin and advil for the swelling this morning.

And the world sucks.

</Homer, backing slowly into the hedge>

Started a new short yesterday on the phone while in town. Boston’s latest adventures, for a future issue of Thrill Ride. Always trying to stay 2-3 issues ahead of everyone in my writing, in case I have to stop and write something at the last minute for one of my magazines to fill space. That’s usually a Sloane Webber story, if you see those.

And why I fired half of the BSQ Syndicate last fall and replaced them with folks who were actually happy to write and deliver stories on time. (…and a little rabid this morning.)

Kincaide 3 is somewhere around 50k. Major plot twist to outsiders, but something that has literally been telegraphed from almost page 1 of book 1. Just took a while to finally unfold, but I promise you you’ll go back and see it. I’m like that.

Got a bunch of other projects that I want to write when I finish Kincaide. And shorts I continue to write on the side, including Harri the Merchant, with two novellas done at present and ready for next year. Gonna write two more so I fill a nice block of stuff, since Kincaide is going to be a three month project, but I knew that, and I write on the phone.

You’ll get your Redlance story tonight. I was too fried and in pain last night to manage it, because I don’t remember where we are and need to write several more of those after Boston.

Crunchy. Getting better. Getting coffee in me to take some of the rusty edges off. Less likely to bite isn’t the same as unlikely, but it’s a Tuesday, and you know what that implies.

Cheers.

shade and sweet water,

b

West of the Mountains, WA

—————————-

Thank you so much for being my patron and for funding these essays!

If you’re reading the free version (which is published three weeks after the Patreon version), please consider joining the ones who do pay at https://www.patreon.com/blazeward. It’s only a buck and helps keeps the lights on around here.