But It's a Dry Heat

Archive for the ‘Urban Fantasy’ Category

With Apologies to Marc Chagall

I stumbled on this while backing up some old data.  It’s a chapter cover from the defunct webcomic, based “loosely” on my novel The Music of Chaos.  It took me about 90 pages to realized I’m not suited to graphical story telling. It was fun while it lasted.

This image was inspired by Chagall’s “The Fiddler,” the painting which, in turn, inspired the title for the musical “Fiddler on the Roof.”

(Click image for larger view.)

White Cat by Holly Black

Is it just me (usually is), or do all of Holly Black’s characters love coffee, including, day old, been sittin’ in the pot, stale coffee? In Black’s books, you can almost count on someone slurkin’ down some nasty, black coffee with zeal.

Black’s Tithe is one of my favorite books.  In particular because of Black’s unflinching depiction of the realities of teenage life.  She doesn’t shy away from drugs, alcohol and violence.

In White Cat, Cassel is the youngest son from a family of Curse Workers.  Curse workers can alter a person’s emotions, memories, and in rare cases, their form. Not surprisingly, curse working has been outlawed. Those who still ply the art tend to gravitate toward less-than-legal vocations. Mobsters, con-artists, etc.

Cassel, however, has no power.  He does, however, have a secret, one which could shatter the normal life he’s worked so hard to maintain.  A few year ago, he killed his best friend, Lila.

But, like old bones, secrets have a way of poking through the surface. Dreams of a white cat and sleepwalking, signal the end of his brief time of normalcy.

While it’s obvious, early on, who, or rather, what Casel is, Black’s engaging style and no-punches pulled approach kept me reading. Black doesn’t burden the story with much exposition.  She presents the world, one much like ours but with Curseworkers, and then gets down to business.  Cassel, as with most of Black’s protagonists, is a young/old man, wise beyond his years. He’s pragmatic, but still quite compassionate.  Despite that, he isn’t my favorite Black character, so White Cat isn’t a keeper.

But I’ll definitely be reading the next book.

The Music of Chaos, Now Available!

I spent the weekend on yet another home improvement project.  Some people tithe at their local house of worship.

We tithe at Home Depot and Lowes.

Anyway, come Monday morning, I find that my debut novel, The Music of Chaos is now available from Decadent Publishing.

****

Here’s the blurb:

Regan O’Connell seems to have it all. She has a PhD and a good paying job as a project manager with a consulting company. Unbeknownst to her co-workers, she’s a one hundred and thirty-year-old demi-human, with a magical pedigree that includes vampires and elven royalty.

Harnessing her magical ability has never been easy. Immature by the standards of immortals, she has little-to-no control over the magic that simmers in her blood. For more than a century, she has worked as a secret operative for the vampire syndicate the Grey Brethren. For just as long, she has hidden her magical disability, struggling with one paranormal misadventure after another. Tired of her shenanigans, the Grey Brethren station her in Albuquerque, far out-of-the-way by paranormal standards.

The arrival of a mysterious user of chaotic magic—a world destroying power—spells the end of Regan’s trouble-free existence. Soon after, her vampire employers issue an ultimatum: find and neutralize the chaotic magic user or find a new job. To make matters worse, she has inadvertently started a war and developed a surprising attraction to a human. Sorting the mess out will require a little help from her friends, some growing up, and acceptance that she will never be a practitioner of conventional magic.

*****

It is available from Decadent Publishing and in Kindle format over at Amazon.  You can also get it at Smashwords.  (Hint: It’s about a buck cheaper if you buy it directly from the publisher.)

The Well-Adjusted Vampire

Coming at the end of October January 2011…The Music of Chaos, my urban fantasy novel, from Decadent Publishing. With all the usual urban fantasy elements–ass-kicking heroine, magic, snappy dialogue, and cheese enchiladas–and absolutely no whiny, schmopey, mopey vampires.

My vampires like being vampires. No “Woe is me, I’m a beautiful immortal with superpowers on an all-liquid diet. I haaate myself” nonsense.

My eyebrows crawled upward. “You realize you just made a movie reference. I am rubbing off on you.”

“Yeah. Like ringworm.”

~Regan O’Connell, the protagonist, and Breas Montrose, vampire, having a warm fuzzy moment.

The Music of Chaos Finds a Home

After an assortment of misadventures, my first novel, The Music of Chaos, has found a home.  I have contracted to publish it with Decadent Publishing, a really new publisher.

And by misadventures, I mean publishers going out of business before the ink is dry on the contract, and, most recently, a publisher with a train wreck of a contract that glommed onto every right in existence.  Uh, yeah.  I turned that contract down.

This is my first post in my new, improved, fuzzy wuzzy (like kittens), and usually PG-rated blog. (As opposed to the more caustic blog, where politics, religion and any number of controversial subjects have been, and still will be, ranted about.)

Cheers, and happy Labor Day Weekend!