Doodle Day

Some days just deserve a doodle.

My day job requires my participating in a lot of teleconferences and in-house meetings. During the course of making notes for these, I'll doodle little squiggles and drawings. Instead of distracting me, as one might assume, the doodling occupies that artsy side of my brain so the more logical part of my mind can better focus and engage with the business at hand. It was the same way back when I was a young boy in school.

Anyway, the accompanying drawing came out of a teleconference. It seems well-suited for a Monday-morning-start-of-the-workweek mood.

The Bleeding Horse

In 2008, Mercier Press (a Irish publishing company) brought out a hardbound collection of short stories, The Bleeding Horse and Other Ghost Stories, by my buddy Brian Showers. This was a nice-looking book with a great dust-jacket painting by the amazing Scott Hampton, who has done a lot of work for DC Comics, including Batman and Simon Dark (the latter with Steve Niles, who created 30 Days of Night). I was very pleased to be a part of this work by providing the black-and-white interior illustrations, one of which I've included here.

Brian crafted his stories about actual locations along Rathmines Road, which leads through the community of Rathmines into Dublin. Woven among the factual and historical bits are the clever fictional elements of the ghost stories, and performs this task so very well that one really can't tell where the truth ends and the fiction begins. The book has some minor popularity among fans of ghost stories, and famed anthologist Ellen Datlow (former fiction editor for Omni Magazine and the Sci Fi Channel's web site, and co-editor of many annual Best Of Fantasy & Horror collections, among others) selected three stories from Bleeding Horse for Honorable Mentions in Best Horror of the Year, volume 1 (2008): "Father Corrigan's Diary," "Favourite No. 7 Omnibus," and "Quis Separabit."

The book's biggest honor came with winning The Children of the Night Award (2008) from The Dracula Society for "the best piece of literature published in the Gothic (including horror or supernatural) genre -- novel, short story, or biography." The competition was stiff that year, with nominations going as well to perennially best-selling author Neil Gaiman (for The Graveyard Book) and John Harwood (The Seance). While Brian's stories carry the show, I hope my illustrations added to the proper atmosphere.

By the way, the Bleeding Horse is the name of a pub. No actual horses were harmed during the writing of these stories.

Pretty Polly now available for the Nook

For those who have been asking, it's now available. Click here to check it out.

Thanks for your interest!

Pretty Polly soon available on Nook

For those who use the Barnes & Noble Nook eReader instead of the Kindle, I just formatted and uploaded Pretty Polly tonight.

It should be available for download in a day or two.

I'll post here when that happens.

Bill Crider reviews Pretty Polly

Another Texas gentleman, Bill Crider, has posted a positive review of Pretty Polly at his blog, Bill Crider's Pop Culture Magazine.

Bill is an accomplished author in the crime and western genres. He writes the Sheriff Dan Rhodes mystery series. He's written some excellent westerns: Two of my favorites are Outrage at Blanco and Texas Vigilante, both about a female gun-for-hire--the story is tough and action-filled, and the prose thrums with that masculine energy that marked the best Gold Medal westerns of the 1950s and '60s.

Bill also is one member of the triumvirate of authors behind the new Rancho Diablo series of novels. The other two writers are James Reasoner and Mel Odom, and the three are penning these western tales under the shared pseudonymn of Colby Jackson. An  interview with Bill about the series is available at the Pulp Serenade blog.

Review of Pretty Polly

Texas gentleman James Reasoner has posted a positive review of Pretty Polly over at his blog, Rough Edges. I greatly appreciate it.

James is a fine writer with more than 200 books to his credit, and more to come. Everything I've read by him has been entertaining. One of my favorites is Under Outlaw Flags, which combines the western with World War I action.

He has two recent releases:

One is a western, Rancho Diablo #2: Hangrope Law, under the pseudonym Colby Jackson. Jackson is a name shared by three writers--Mel Odom, Bill Crider, and James--who are writing a western series they've created under a single nom de sixshooter. They are releasing the Rancho Diablo series as eBooks for the Kindle and the Nook.

His second new release is from Berkley, Redemption, Kansas. It's available both as a paperback and an eBook. Troy D. Smith has a nice review of Redemption, Kansas, over at the Western Fictioneers blog.

James' review of Pretty Polly suggests that the villain, Griswold Bear (aka Grizzly or Grisly, depending on whom your talking to), should make a return appearance. I have to admit I hadn't thought about that. I fully expect Sheriff Shoat to show up in another story, but maybe Griswold also deserves another fictional outing. I'll have to let that percolate in the brain pan. It's worth considering.

Coming Features: Projects in progress

Time for a few hints, but no hard facts:

Once Pretty Polly went live on Kindle, I took a look at what was in progress and began assessing next steps.

(By the way, Many Thanks to those folks who have purchased a copy so far! If you like the story, please go to the Kindle Store and add a customer review. Many potential customers become actual customers if they get the chance to read what other folks have to say about a book.)

I'm in the process of formatting a second story for Kindle release. This story has, like Pretty Polly, had a previous publication in a print anthology, but that collection of stories didn't have as wide a release as Where Legends Ride. So I hope the eBook edition will expose it to a wider audience.

I'm also investigating what sort of formatting and changes I need to make to the Pretty Polly file to prepare it for release as a Nookbook. I know some folks love their Nooks as vociferously as others adore their Kindles, so I'll be making the western available for the Nook readers as well. While Kindle requires some basic html formatting, the Nook requires ePub formatting, which is a bit different standard. So I feel a little like I'm in geometry class--a brand new learning curve awaits.

After the currently-in-formatting-mode story is available as a Kindle eBook, it will also be appropriately tweaked for the Nook.

(By the way, if you don't have a Kindle or a Nook device, you can still read Kindle and Nook ebooks on your PC or laptop--you can download the Kindle application and the Nook application to your PC or laptop [or other mobile device] for free. Just click here for the Kindle, and here for the Nook.)

So, after the second story is released, what next?

I've turned in a 30,000-word novella to a small press (printed format) publisher, who has accepted it. There's no release date as yet, while the artist is at work, but when I have news, I'll share it here.

Meanwhile, I'm currently working on four books in a vigorous manner. One of these is getting most of the attention, and will likely be the next to appear. Each is in a slightly different genre than the others, but I think any of them will appeal to some of the same readers.

I hope no one minds these ambiguous teasers. I just want to let folks know that more is on the way.

Many thanks for your patronage!

Have a great day!