Tag: Westmarch Publishing

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AnomalyCon 2016

Just a quick note to say that I’ll be attending AnomalyCon this year as a panelist. What is AnomalyCon? It’s a science fiction/fantasy convention that takes place the last weekend of March in Denver. Its main focus is steampunk, but it encompasses everything from time travel to alternate history. As I have heard very good things about the conference, I’m very much looking forward to it and to meeting up with fellow Westmarchers there—Stant Litore, Melissa Olson, Richard Ellis Preston, and Roberto Calas.

If you’re in or near Denver, come and join the fun! There are panels, writing workshops, book signings, the weekend’s murder mystery, the somewhat frightening sounding Victorian swimsuit competition, and the delightfully intriguing activity of…tea dueling?
Here we must pause to check out the official rules of tea dueling on the AnomalyCon’s own website. The rules of tea dueling (or, as they spell it to give it the steampunk flavor, tea duelling) are these:

Two duelists sit across from each other at a table, each with a cup of tea and a biscuit (or cookie). 

On the count they dip their cookies in the tea, and then it’s a game to stare each other down until one lifts out his biscuit and tries to eat it. The winner is the one who both holds his biscuit in the longest AND gets the entire biscuit into his mouth without it breaking.

Now I’m not saying I’ll be participating (except maybe in the tea-drinking part from the sidelines) but tea dueling does bring to mind this hilarious real-life anecdote told by Douglas Adams.
If that’s not enough, you can come look for me at my book table (somewhere in the dealer’s room, I think) or drop by one of the panels I’ll be participating in:

Closing The Loop Editing and re-editing and outlining and reviewing and getting your book out to an agent…you have so much to do now that you’ve finished your first novel draft. Where do you go from here? Saturday 10:00 a.m. 

The Critic And Me Ever felt like something was terrible about three seconds after you finished it? This is about controlling your control freak and making things even with the doubt. Saturday 1:00 p.m.  

Time Travel and The World of Tomorrow Is Time Travel possible? Discuss ideas about time travel from various fictional resources, as well as real science strides being made toward travel through time. Saturday 3:00 p.m.  

Evolving The Writing Process Have an idea, but can’t seem to get started? The answer isn’t always just “Write write write!” Sunday 2:00 p.m. 

The Rules of Time Travel A practical primer for the traveler in all of us.  Sunday 3:00 p.m.

The full schedule can be found here.
In other, non-travel news, work of the new novel is progressing, but—as always—more slowly than I would like! I can never see the end of the tunnel until I’m actually there, which is why I don’t like to make predictions about when the book might be done. But I am closer to the end than the beginning, so that’s something.
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Launch Day: The Bellbottom Incident

The Bellbottom Incident is now available both in paperback and on Kindle! You can find the book here in the US Kindle store, here in the UK store, and here in Canada. I’ve started to get some sales in Australia (*waves hello to Australians*) so I’m going to add that link as well.

Launch days tend to be somewhat of a bittersweet occasion. You’ve done all you can for the book and it’s now time to send it into the world and hope it finds its wings. That’s not quite true, of course, as there is still plenty that can be done and that needs to be done for the book — working on promotions, arranging giveaways, perhaps a book signing, and so forth. But mostly you’ve said good-bye to the characters, to the story.

That’s even more the case when it’s the last one in a series, as The Bellbottom Incident is; while there may be at least one short story to go along with the series, the three full length novels are done and it is time to clear the board and get cracking on that next idea.

So here’s hoping The Bellbottom Incident finds its wings. There’s already a nice 5-star review on Amazon to greet the book, and a giveaway happening on Goodreads. More to come!

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The Bellbottom Incident – paperback available early!

Psst! 

A bit of news just for my mailing list subscribers (well, and for anyone who follows me on Twitter or Facebook, and possibly some places I’ve forgotten my feed goes to…) Anyways, here it is: The Bellbottom Incident paperback has gone up on Amazon TEN DAYS EARLY. The Kindle version is still on track for release at the end of this month, March 31. But as of today, you can find the papeback for sale on Amazon US and on Amazon UK. 

Hope you all like this one and happy reading!


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Cover Reveal: The Bellbottom Incident

Amazon’s algorithms sent out the “Coming Soon” email this morning, sooner than I expected, so this isn’t exactly a cover unveiling as everyone can already see it on the Kindle preorder page.  But here goes anyway. Ta-da:

The Far Time Incident, the first book in the series, had a cover that was on the light side, off-white and gray. The Runestone Incident cover was mostly black with some red accents. So for this third one we went with lots of color, which also happened to match the time period the book takes place in. That it’s the seventies is pretty clear from the title, I think! TheBookDesigners get the credit for turning my vague word-sketch into a lovely and eye-catching cover.

Here is the back-page description:

Julia Olsen and Nate Kirkland, St. Sunniva University’s time-traveling crime-stoppers, are back and facing their toughest challenge yet in this third and final installment of the series. Sabina, their adopted niece from the lost city of Pompeii, has gone missing—in the bellbottom decade, of all places.  

The situation requires sharp investigative skills of the literary kind, as Sabina has managed to outwit History and disappear into parts unknown, with the only clues to her whereabouts hidden in a Kurt Vonnegut novel. But fiction and reality collide as it soon becomes clear that the consequences may be all too real…and all too high. Can Julia and her teammates rescue the out-of-her-time Sabina before the final, unstoppable showdown with History?  

Continuing where The Far Time Incident and The Runestone Incident leave off, The Bellbottom Incident brings the series to a gripping conclusion in this lively adventure through history, science, and literature.

Though only the Kindle book has gone up for preorder, there will be a print book of course, releasing the same day, March 31. This final book in the series comes to you via Westmarch Publishing, so there are some changes in how things got done, but none that should affect the reading experience itself, which is all that matters.

Thanks for supporting my books and hope you enjoy this one as much as I did writing it!