Archive for the 'Books' Category
July 24th, 2011 by jdsawyer
Grab a pack of cards. Strap your pressure suit on. It’s time to head to the poker game that started it all, and the book that View From Valhalla called “lovingly detailed, well-written thinking man’s science fiction at its best.*”
Joss Kyle is a one-time National Security Advisor who barely escaped Washington D.C. with his skin intact. For three years he’s lived by his wits and the fall of the cards in the criminal underworld of South America, but jumping planet for Space Station Sidon means walking into an ambush more dangerous than any he’s yet faced:
A man named Alex Hart wants to play cards with him.
Their meeting will fling Joss into a game playing for highest stakes in town: control of the entire solar system. Chased by a revolutionary leader, agents of a corrupt senator, and an underworld boss known only as The Green Lady, he quickly discovers that in the looking-glass world above the gravity well, survival, like poker, is just another sport. And in this contest, it isn’t whether you win or lose, it’s how you rig the game.
Now available in paperback from AWP Science Fiction, Predestination is the story Nathan Lowell calls “A sweeping tale of politics, corruption, intrigue, betrayal, and murder…a fast-paced ride through a world that’s too plausible to be ignored**” and that Brand Gamblin calls “…a lush, powerful story of hunter and pray, betrayal and rebellion, and poker.***.” Available for the first time ever in paper, this handsome new edition rings in at 341 pages contains the full text of the ebook edition, plus new line art and a sample of the sequel, Free Will.
Now, it’s true that you can buy the novel at Amazon now, and you’ll be able to find it in bookstores this fall, but for you loyal folk that read my blog, it’s available for a special rate. Until Worldcon, buy your copy by clicking here and using the coupon code XX2QR2Z8, and you’ll receive $2.00 off the $14.99 cover price.
Finally, for those of you who run vending booths at conventions (or who work in bookstores) and would like to carry Predestination (or any of my other books), shoot me an email from the Contact Form and I will send you the AWP Books wholesale pricing schedule.
I’ll be back soon with news about Free Will and Down From Ten, but until then remember…
It isn’t whether you win or lose, it’s how you rig the game.
*Odin1eye, View From Valhalla
**Nathan Lowell, Author of The Golden Age of the Silver Clipper
***Brand Gamblin, author of Tumbler and The Hidden Institute
July 15th, 2011 by jdsawyer
You hear a lot of talk of “discovery writers” and “outliners” in the writing world. The “pantsers” and the “plotters,” respectively. It’s true that there are a lot of people that fall into both categories–including many of my friends–and human nature loves dichotomies, but I’ve never fit comfortably either, and I suspect I’m not alone.
Last night, I had occasion to have a long conversation with a new writer who’s vexed and confused by the options before him when it comes to writing process, and saying “you have to find your own way” only left him more despondent. I know that look–I’ve been there many times when faced with a new field of endeavor with so many options that at once feel constraining and non-specific. So, in the hope of letting those new writers who don’t comfortably fit a category know that they’re not alone, I’m going to describe my method.
Continue reading ‘Playing Jazz With Words’
July 12th, 2011 by jdsawyer
So, Free Will is in prep for release right now, with the typos and other nit-picky details being worked over, layout being done, etc. It’s a big step forward in the Antithesis Progression, and there are a lot of you out there who have been waiting patiently for the series to continue.
Some of you will get a sneak peak. You see, this is a big book. It ate up more pages, and more time, than I expected by an order of magnitude, and I’m eager to see it find a good home on the shelves and in the e-readers of all of you, including those of you who have drifted away in the meantime, intending to come back when the series continued.
To let people know Antithesis is back, we’re going to need publicity. Publicity means you! Some of you out there enjoy blogging, posting opinion pieces and reviews, etc., and you are the ones I need. Starting today, the first hundred of you that email me (either the normal way through the feedback at jdsawyer.net address, or through the web form you can find here) with the subject line “Free Will Ebook” will receive a free, pre-copyedits ebook version of Free Will (and a corrected version once the proofs are done).
In return for receiving this advance review copy, you promise to blog the book when you’ve finished reading it and, once the book is released to the general public in the next week or two, to post a copy or extract of your blog review in two of the following: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, Goodreads, Kobo, Sony ebook store, Kobo, iBookstore. Those of you who feel enthusiastic enough about the book to post the review in all those places will be entered into a drawing. The four prizes in that drawing will be:
A copy of the signed-and-numbered collector’s edition of the Predestination poster
A signed paperback copy of Predestination
A signed paperback copy of Down From Ten
A Clarke Lantham Mysteries 2-pack: Paperbacks of And Then She Was Gone and A Ghostly Christmas Present
Spread the word!
Also, watch this space. There will be more announcements in the coming days about casting calls, a new Death Threats contest, and other goodies.
July 11th, 2011 by jdsawyer
As of last night, the fact-checking of what’s currently going by the uninspired name of “The Gun Book” came to a close. We’re now on to layout and diagram phase, as it’s a graphics-rich book. Once I get a proper title for it, it’s going to be a guide to firearms for writers. A spin-off short piece on science fiction weaponry that wound up not fitting in the book will appear next weekend in the relevant markets.
But, more importantly for those who have been quietly composing your death threats:
Free Will is done. The continuity edit, all the little fixes, it’s all done. All that’s left now is the copy edit, which’ll take a few days. With any luck, we’re looking at an ebook release this weekend or early next week.
We’re also currently breaking scripts out. Expect a casting call around the same time as the ebook release!
July 2nd, 2011 by jdsawyer
Neurological pharmacology–a fancy way of saying “what drugs do to brains”–is a subject with which I have a special fascination. Some of them accentuate specific aspects of personality, some create hallucinations and religious experience, some relieve depression, some kick the sex drive or the bonding drive into high gear. In a lot of ways, though, for my money, I’d nominate alcohol as the most interesting for one reason:
In vino, veritas. Pliny the Elder nailed it: Wine tells the truth. It doesn’t make you do things so much as it lets you do things. You can learn a lot about yourself, and about your friends, by watching what happens when they’re well-buzzed.
National holidays can do the same thing to people–and not just because of the amount of alcohol people tend to consume given half an excuse. Like all things, love of one’s country can come in a lot of flavors. Soviet dissidents, for example, loved their country while hating its system–they loved its culture, its geography, its weather, the shared history in which their identity was rooted. Members of totalitarian systems, on the other hand, are trained to identify the system with the country, and to see non-conformity as so unpatriotic as to deserve death. Some people are patriotic about countries where they’ve never lived, so much so that they’ll move across the world to live in them, because they’ve fallen in love with the ideology, or the people, or the culture of that country. You can learn a lot about a person by watching the flavor of their patriotism.
Writing a political thriller series these last few years, I’ve carefully watched the political micro-climates around the world and studied how they relate to the version of love of country I carry around in my own psyche. Call it a love affair with the Jeffersonian vision of freedom: “I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”
This year has been an amazing year around the world for the struggle against different forms of tyranny, and as an Americans it’s been more exciting than I can say to watch the most action-packed year of calculated struggles against tyranny since the late 80s and early 90s (it’s also more than a little embarrassing how little my home culture seems interested in carrying on their struggle on the home front, but that’s a topic for another time). It’s quite possible that the Arab Spring, the Iranian struggles, and the other protests and revolutions around the world will all come to bad ends in the same way that the revolutions of the twentieth century almost all ended in dictatorship, civil war, and genocide; still, I have a thin hope that some of the people who are laying down their lives–for reasons as simple as the next loaf of bread or as idealistic as bringing democracy and universal suffrage to cultures where such notions are without precedent–may have read history and learned from the missteps of the last hundred years.
Because of that, in celebration of the first revolution that actually worked (if imperfectly), I’ve dedicated Free Will (my new book about revolution) as follows:
This volume is dedicated to the men and women
Who sat in Tahrir
Who crossed the Wall in Berlin
Who fell at Tiananmen Square
Who bled in the streets of Tehran
Who lost their lives in Boston
And all those like them before and since.
To them we owe a debt we cannot repay
Save that we make their dream come true
For Everyone
Forever.
I’ll be seeing you soon, with the rest of the book. Have a safe weekend–and spend it however you want to. The ability to make that choice is a remarkable thing in the history of the world.
June 16th, 2011 by jdsawyer
Have you ever seen that well-dressed 
man at the airport, or the station, who stands patiently by as if he has all the time in the world? Have you wondered who he was waiting for, and how long he’d stay? Have you ever been that man, stuck in the hours between delay and disappointment, with no way to know if the person you’re waiting for will show? Let fancy take you to the mountains of Northern Italy at the dawn of the 22nd century for the story of a woman and a train–and of a walking stick and the man who owns it, as he waits for Train Time.
You can find the story at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords. Below, you can find a sample.
Enjoy!
—Story Sample Below The Cut—
Continue reading ‘Released: Train Time’
May 26th, 2011 by jdsawyer
Today is the day I was hoping to post the announcement for the ebook of Down From Ten. Unfortunately, I got right to the edge and realized I still had some rights clearances to do for song lyrics that are quoted in the book, so it’ll be another few days.
However, it IS coming in the next week or less!
May 22nd, 2011 by jdsawyer
And the seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air; and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, saying “It is done.”
All the original writing for Free Will is now done. I have a few days of continuity tweaking ahead of me, and then some cutting, but it really is now all over but the shouting.
New equipment for the studio arrives this week, and I’ll be resuming production on everything in two weeks after I give things a proper shakedown and take a day or two off.
What does this mean for you?
Predestination and Free Will paperbacks (and Free Will ebook) in June. New episodes of Sculpting God in June. New episodes of Free Will starting in July, and continuing through to the end of the book.
It’s been a marathon–two years of work plotting and researching, and four solid months of aggregated writing time over those two years.. Final count: 212k words. Manuscript page count: 848. (Don’t worry, that will shrink as I shake out the continuity).
Time to crack the champagne!
April 16th, 2011 by jdsawyer
It’s tax weekend, and if you’re like most 
Americans you’re madly rushing to get your forms (or extensions) filed. Of course, if you’re not American, you’ll have to deal with taxes sooner or later anyway. In either case, chances are you’ll hit the end of your weekend and be forced from the gorgeous spring weather to the inside of an office, or a warehouse, or a truck–and that’s when you’ll really need a bit of a vacation.
As your fantasy travel agent, allow me to offer you a guided tour of the San Francisco Bay Area like you’ve never seen it before: through the eyes of detective Clarke Lantham, sentenced to the hell of the suburbs in his quest to find a missing teenage girl. For the first time in paperback from AWP Mystery comes And Then She Was Gone, the adventure described by Gail Carriger as “full of snappy one-liners I’m dying to quote” and by Seth Harwood as “a mystery so dark and complex that you could lose a molar biting into it.”
Now available from AWP Mystery in paperback, And Then She Was Gone is a tense, funny, action packed adventure that sticks its fingers just under edge in order to flip it over. The handsome new edition rings in at 214 pages contains the full text of the ebook edition, plus a map detailing the geography that plays such an integral role in the story, along with a sample of the second Clarke Lantham novel, A Ghostly Christmas Present.
Now, it’s true that you can buy the novel at Amazon now, and you’ll be able to find it in bookstores this fall, but for you loyal folk that read my blog, it’s available for a special rate. Until May 15, buy your copy by clicking here and using the coupon code Q38WV4AS, and you’ll receive $1.50 off the $9.99 cover price.
Finally, for those of you who run vending booths at conventions (or who work in bookstores) and would like to carry And Then She Was Gone, shoot me an email from the Contact Form and I will send you the AWP Books wholesale pricing schedule.
I’ll see you between the pages!
April 4th, 2011 by jdsawyer
When I started writing The Antithesis Progression, I had a nice, tidy three-book series in mind. Then I wrote it, and discovered that what I thought was book 1 was actually 2 books cleverly hiding inside my head under a single title.
Well, no problem there. Turns out there was an excellent break point where book 1 could end naturally–and on a very nice cliffhanger–so I could move on to the new book 2 (which was originally the planned second half of book 1). I’d just sit down and write book 2 as soon as the time afforded.
Yeah.
If you’ve been following my progress with this book, you already know how that bright idea turned out. I’ve gotten four other books written in the meantime, and I’m quick on the way to finishing a further two, and still Free Will mocks me with its recalcitrance. And it’s not because I haven’t kicked ass on writing it either: Predestination rang in at 122,000 words after some serious cutting post-podcast and only had to cope with four major storylines. That’s a healthy sized book–it’s fantasy-novel length. Free Will is…well…bigger.
Continue reading ‘The Great Cull (Free Will Update)’
April 1st, 2011 by jdsawyer
Preface:
Despite the date, this is not an April Fool’s joke. With that out of the way, here goes…
Ladies, Gentlemen, and those of you who are anything but, I am pleased to announce this spring’s publishing schedule (well, for my books anyway) from AWP Books. In no particular order, here’s what’s coming:
The Clarke Lantham Mysteries
#1 And Then She Was Gone Ebook: Already Available. Paperback: April 15
#2 A Ghostly Christmas Present Ebook: Already Available. Paperback: July 21
The Antithesis Progression
#0 The Man In The Rain Ebook: April 10
#1 Predestination Ebook: April 20. Paperback: June 20
#2 Free Will Ebook and Paperback: July 4
Down From Ten
Ebook: August 1. Paperback: August 1 (see poll in sidebar)
Short Stories
Cold Duty Ebook: April 10
Angels Unawares Ebook: April 10
We Create Worlds Ebook: April 20
The Coffee Service Ebook: May 10
Train Time Ebook: May 10
It should be a great spring!
March 31st, 2011 by jdsawyer
The good folks at AWP Books and I have a decision to make: What order do we publish things in? In the process of discussions, it occurred to us that you all might have an opinion, so here’s your chance to vote:
[poll id="2"]
You may vote for two of the three options (this is to let you voice your desire for hardbacks, as well as priority). Let us know what you want!
January 10th, 2011 by jdsawyer
It’s mid January, and time for your vegetables. This year’s first link salad is here–I hope you enjoy this sampling of my weidrness and wanderings from around the web!
Continue reading ‘Link Salad, Jan 10, 2011′
December 27th, 2010 by jdsawyer
Time for your vegetables again — these are some of the highlights of my research journeys hither and yon in the great wasteland of cyberspace. Hope you enjoy!
Continue reading ‘Link Salad 12/27/10′
December 19th, 2010 by jdsawyer
The new Clarke Lantham Mystery is here. Explore the true meaning of Christmas with murder, mayhem, ghosts, and unfortunate accidents of physics!
It’s hard to beat being thrown in an out-of-state jail on a trumped up charge 
as a Christmas present, but detective Clarke Lantham loves a challenge. So when he calls up his brother for help with bail, he thinks he’s prepared for the ordeal of spending a holiday weekend with relatives who put the “strange” back in “estranged.”
That was his first mistake. Unfortunately, with an old client gumming up the works, a ten-year-old niece with a ghost problem, and the occasional murder competing for his attention, it’s unlikely to be his last.
Currently available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Smashwords.
