Happy birthday to us! This blog is four this month. We can stand up without messing ourselves, and we remember to put the lid back on when we've been thieving from the biscuit tin. Ah, those happy few months between nappies and glue sniffing...
As a birthday gift from me to you, here are number of links for you to click on, dear reader, apart from the one above that takes you to my dystopian thriller, 2084, which you will already have bought, of course. Think of them as stepping stones to happiness.
Firstly, Terraform have my story, A Second Opinion, live on their site. All my own work, as it were.
Third Flatiron, via their newspage, have launched their Monstrosities anthology, which includes a modest contribution from me. I think that link will move with the times; you may find this link to Amazon to (pre-)order it more stable. Go on, you know you want to.
Martin Greening's Tales of Ruma's kickstarter campaign is up and running. I have a slightly less modest story somewhere within. Invest $50 and get yourself a limited edition hardcover.
And this, Images Across a Shattered Sea by Stewart C Baker, in which I have no hand at all, but stumbled across and really rather enjoyed.
A review! Of 2084! A real review on goodreads.com, a four star review to boot:
It was an interesting story but I totally did not understand the ending!!!??? What?? It was like I had changed books or something. I was with the story till then. Was I missing some pages that explained how the main character's life changed??
Thank you Millie.
I’m pleased with that. One of the books that sticks most in my mind is The Getaway by Jim Thompson, a great read, but a story with an ending that smacks of being written in a panic and on so many drugs that the author was probably as surprised by the denouement as his readership. And I’d argue the clues as to where my story goes are pretty clearly laid out - in fact, I wouldn’t even describe it as a twist ending. But it’s good to know that I’ve wrong-footed a reader at the death, without leaving anybody with a twisted ankle.
I’ll gloss over the fact that Millie tends to give five star reviews - she’s that kind of girl (no, I mean glass half full, not lacking in critical faculties). Four stars is a long way from shoddy, and even Thompson gets 3.98.
Of course, The Getaway was filmed, with a more run of the mill ending, with Steve McQueen and Ali McGraw. Me? I’d settle for Sanjiv Bhaskar and that girl from 3-Headed Shark Attack...
