Out of the Debauched Sloth
Chaz Brenchley's Fortnightly Newsletter
“We cannot make good news out of bad practice.” - Edward R Murrow
...so what do I have for you this fortnight? Only the finest practice: you may now practise pre-ordering TOWER OF THE KING’S DAUGHTER in either ebook or paper formats!
If you’re not up to speed with the series, this is vol two and you do really need to read vol one first. In brief, this is my Crusader fantasy with a gay knight and his much-troubled squire, who is either blessed or cursed with a magical ability he neither wanted nor has ever understood, also featuring a pair of runaway girls, a vanished land, a holy war and a territorial war and quite a lot else besides. Djinn and ’ifrit and the like, eg. No cats, though. I don’t think there are cats. It got lovely reviews on its first appearance, twenty-five years ago; this is the spruced-up Author’s Cut. You can order the first volume, THE DEVIL IN THE DUST, at any of the links on this page at the Wizard’s Tower website.
What else, now? Oh, yes. I have started a new thing. (I know, I know. I am always starting new things, and the list of things I have yet to finish only grows ever longer as a result. And yet, here I am, a-doing of it again. Been like this all my life, sorry not sorry. Most things do eventually get finished, if that’s any comfort.)
By special request of someone who wanted to be nice to me, I opened a Ko-fi account so that she and like-minded people could buy me a virtual coffee. Nosing around the site, I discovered that it has a whole lot more potential than just begging for caffeine, so I am exploring options. Anyone who subscribes to buy me one (or more!) coffees a month gets access to old and unavailable stories, etc, whatever I happen to dig out of the archive around the first of the month; but for more ongoing fun, I have started writing a new short story (which is already dangerously close to a novelette, so who knows how long it’ll be before the end?). Every time someone buys me a coffee, I write and post another page. Sherlock Holmes on Mars, people: Holmes in his age, taking the opportunity to retire to a new land and lighter gravity, where “retirement” does not of course prevent his taking cases. Or, indeed, an apprentice... You can catch up with the story-so-far at my Ko-fi page; if you enjoy what you find there, buy me a coffee and keep the story going...
Other useful links, to keep abreast of all the stuff I’m up to:
Patreon, where you may learn of the adventures of English boarding-school girls on Mars, and also serial killers and other such. Half a million words up there, and counting: access to all that for, again, the price of a cup of coffee...
Medium, where Mrs Bailey (the cook at the Crater School mentioned above) likes to post her recipes in “Mrs Bailey’s Martian Kitchen”. I occasionally find other things to talk about, but mostly it’s Mrs B and her system-wide influences; there are many communities on Mars (I mean, c’mon, the Empire found itself with a whole empty planet to colonise; until the Great War against the Tsar, it was “come one, come all,” and a great many disadvantaged people took advantage) and one way or another she has developed links and relationships with all of them.
And here’s the link to the first eighteen pages of the Sherlock-Holmes-on-Mars story, all in one convenient post, to see if that teases you into wanting more...
’Til next time,
- Chaz