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Writing & Publishing Projects In The Works: 5/24/09 It's 1918, you're a German sniper in WWI and you save a buddy's life, a lance corporal named Adolph Hitler. Now it's April 1945, you're hiding in a Berlin basement as the Russians churn the rubble overhead with bombs and rockets, suddenly you're ordered to come to the Fuhrer's bunker to repair the ventilation system. Did I mention you're also Jewish? It looks as though Asimov's is going to take this one, which is great. I got my start at Asimov's and this story is one of my best. I'm guessing an appearance late in the year.  Back Looking 4/11/09 Ghost story promised to an anthology. What if you really need a vacation but don't have either the money or the days off from your job? What about trading jobs for a few weeks with someone who works in the spot you want to visit? Well, you still have to work, but you have weekends and nights free to explore. That you'd be filling in for a ghost and the ghost would be filling in for you is just something that needs to be worked out. Finally I get to use all that research I did on Carlsbad Caverns and murder by stealth. Grump. Crossed wires and whatnot. I had to withdraw "The Swap" from the anthology. You've heard, perhaps, of what too many cooks do to the broth? Too many editors appear to be a similar asset.  5/08/09 Ice age time travel novel intended to be the first of a series following the adventures of Gordon Redcliff and the Black Mountain people into the future they were never supposed to have. Part I is now appearing in the July/August issue of Analog. It's a good yarn and worth your time. A warning. If it was me, I'd wait until I got Part II in the September issue before I began Part I. A word to the wise . . . The manuscript for the complete novel is at my agent's making the rounds.  Bloody Lane 5/5/2009 The tour of the battlefields for my Civil War mystery-thriller is concluded, and the hairier aspects of the trip are covered on the News Page. The picture is of one end of Bloody Lane at the Antietam Battlefield, Sharpsburg, Maryland. The view of the battlefield from the observation tower is spectacular. There is no elevator, however, which is why I ran out of air there and had to get my heart fixed. For Civil War buffs, the National Park Service has been restoring the battlefields to what they looked like during the battles, at least as far as foliage is concerned. It made the research much easier than I expected. I've been asked when the book will be ready for a publisher, and I don't seem to have any control over that unless I have a contract deadline in hand and a cleared check in the bank. I hope to have the completed manuscript by the end of 2010. This estimate is somewhere between wishful thinking and a pipe dream.  2/23/09 Mystery. You're a police detective, you've almost died, you're being congratulated for killing three mobsters you don't recall killing, and during your formative years your father was the state hangman. Now your shrink wants you to write the story of your life. The big rewrite is completed and the manuscript off to the agent. Very proud of this one.  2/23/2009 Sequel to The Hangman's Son, in which Joe Torio goes undercover at an institution for the violently insane -as a patient. Object: prove a serial killer there isn't guilty of all the murders with which he has been charged. While rewriting The Hangman's Son, I couldn't resist polishing this one a bit. New MS at my agent's.  Guy Shad 2/5/09 The popular Jaggers and Shad SF series (along with two episodes never before published) has been gathered in book form and is currently at my agent's being peddled to wherever. One of the unpublished stories, "The Sheriff's Tale," I hope to read at Readercon this year. We'll see if Programming can find me enough space.  2/10/09 Mystery. So you went and killed a guy who surprised you while you were ransacking his home. So, he's a mystery writer? Big deal. He has a collaborator? So what? Another mystery writer? Old, feeble, flabby bookworm, you're really worried about him, right? . . . except the dead guy's friend really knows an awful lot of ways to kill someone. Hmmm. MS bounced at Ellery Queen's, now slightly polished, retitled, and off to AHMM. THE WRITE STUFF. The online seminar in book form. I've gotten good feedback from Stanley Schmidt at Analog and Gordon Van Gelder at F&SF, as well as from my original crop of writers. Manuscript awaiting revisions.
The online writing seminar is still available for those interested in career writing and who don't tremble before a big challenge. Instead of sending in for the free intro, it's now a page in the Webmansion. Hit the Icon and and read "Writing: A Way of Life."  |
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