News for July 9th, 2009

Taylor Kent says: We will be gathering in front of our
computers on Thursday night (7/9/2009 at 8:30 PM CT) to enjoy another
voyage into Snark Infested Waters. This week I have a guest in the
snark tank, Jeff Gerke author (under the pen name Jefferson Scott -
http://www.jeffersonscott.com/

) and founder of Marcher Lord Press
(http://www.marcherlordpress.com). So come out and join the fun and
bring your questions for Jeff. As per usual we will take questions
from the chat room during the second half of the show so bring any
questions you have concering Macher Lord Press, Christian Speculative
Fiction, and/or anything else.

Snark Infested Waters will be recorded live on Thrusday 7/9/2009 at
8:30 PM CT/9:30 PM ET/6:30 PM PT. Extra video content will start at
8:25 PM CT and the after party will run from 9:30 PM CT until 10:00 PM
CT. The direct link to the show is:
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/snark-infested-waters

I look forward to see you all there.

The related post can be found at: http://thesnarkyavenger.com/?p=560

Johne Cook says: "Blessed Are the Peacemakers," an homage to Keith Laumer's 'Retief' character, is the featured story in Issue 02 of Digital Dragon magazine:
http://www.digitaldragonmagazine.net/

A former space marine is caught between his principles and his duty as he juggles working for an old enemy while trying to forge a crucial treaty with a ferocious alien race.

http://www.digitaldragonmagazine.net/cook-peacemakers.php

When writing this story, I specifically tried to write something that was classic Science Fiction and frankly Christian. I like how it turned out. At 2100 words, it's the shortest non-Flash thing I've written, and I like how quickly it moves for a multi-scene story. Check it out, and read the rest of the offerings in this installment of the new project from T. W. Ambrose and Randy Streu! I think you'll like what they're doing.

Johne's stories are also featured on Cathi-Lyn Dyck's blog here: http://scitascienda.wordpress.com/2009/07/06/muse-monday-featuring-johne-cook

News for July 6th, 2009

Terri Main says: Tuesday July 7th at 7 pm (PST) we will be meeting in Second Life. The location for the meeting can be found at http://www.tinyurl. com/sllgg
Second Life is a virtual world. You will need to download software and select an avatar in order to take part in the dicussion featuring both voice and text-base chats.
The meeting will run from 7 - 8 pm.

Fred Warren wrote a new review of Leaps of Faith, the sci-fi anthology edited by Karina and Robert Fabian: http://frederation.wordpress.com/2009/07/03/book-review-leaps-of-faith-edited-by-robert-and-karina-fabian/

Bryan Polivka says: Ahoy from the land of mythical beasts, mysterious beauty, and the odd miracle now and again... Nearing Vast has seen some miracles, large and small. Here's a truly odd one. Smith Delaney, one of our favorite pirates and a most thoughtful ponderer, has turned up on Twitter. You can follow his musings from his post on his pond (he calls these musings "posts" for the obvious reason). Look him up at www.twitter.com/SmithDelaney.

Update from Marcher Lord Press

Jeff Gerke says: I'm excited to report that the second release list of MLP titles has officially earned out (publishing lingo for "broken even"). After only two months, the second list is in the black. I was been thrilled that the first list had earned out in only four months. The second did it in two months. What's in store for the third list? Speaking of the third list, I now have the first book for list #3 under contract. You're going to love this thing. Think Asimov meets Muhammad in space. ;-) Marcher Lord Press was mentioned in a national publication in June. The sales event went beautifully (despite the hacking of my site). And my fiction craft book continues to wow readers. Read on to find out more. Jeff Gerke Publisher Marcher Lord Press

The Second List Breaks Even

Led by strong independent sales of The Dark Man, the author's massive marketing genius and great Amazon sales of By Darkness Hid, and strong promotional efforts for Starfire, the second release list from Marcher Lord Press has earned out. In only two months.

Not all the books have independently hit the tipping point, but put together the combined sales of all three have definitely pushed us over the top.

That means I can look forward to list 3 in full confidence that it can go forward as planned. When you're a small press, you live season to season. If season 1 does well, you can do a season 2. Now our season 2 has done well so we can do a season 3.

It shows the extreme importance of you, the loyal fan. Continue supporting Marcher Lord Press as you have and MLP can continue. Thank you for what you do!

Last month's sales promotion was a great success. It was fun hearing the reactions from people who got to discover the "The Istaka Passage," the 10,500-word-long set of scenes that was actually a subplot originally written for Hero, Second Class.

I've got one book for list 3 already under contract. Hopefully in August I'll be able to talk about all three books I will (he said by faith) by then have under contract.

Finally, Marcher Lord Press and our title By Darkness Hid by Jill Williamson was mentioned in USA Today in June! How cool is that? That's great exposure for lil' ol' us! Check out the article.

News for June 29th, 2009

Here's another batch of summer reading for you (winter for me, but that's because I live in the future)!

Issue 53 of Ray Gun Revival is here - your usual batch of short stories, serials, and reviews.

Stories at Residential Aliens:
Square Peg by Stoney M. Setzer
The Kitterson Ranch Incident by Brandon Barr
(Be sure and check out the other stuff on there too!)

Jill Williamson says: Whoo hoo! My book, By Darkness Hid, got featured on the USA Today Faith and Reason book club blog! I'm so excited! http://content.usatoday.com/communities/religion/post/2009/06/68492969

News for June 26th, 2009

The current edition of Latest in Spec has just come out this week and you can access it by going here: http://lostgenreguild.com/files/LatestinSpecJune09.pdf - For all sorts of cool industry news and info, brought to you by Rebecca LuElla Miller and Cynthia MacKinnon.


And today we have a rather funny interlude for you. Frank Peretti appears in two Facebook videos where he attempts to give advice to a budding writer who is rather too sensitive for critique...

On MRUs and Character Names

On Signposting and Crumples

News for June 24th, 2009

Here's a really interesting interview with Karina Fabian about her publisher, Swimming Kangaroo, and the ins and outs of self-marketing, with a bunch of fascinating facts and useful links:
http://chrischatreviews.blogspot.com/2009/06/swimming-kangaroos-karina-fabian.html

And this week marks the CSFF blog tour for Tom Pawlik's "Vanish" - go to http://csffblogtour.com/?p=377 for a list of participating bloggers.

News for June 22nd, 2009

Check out Derek Gilbert's new radio show, View From The Bunker!

In this first edition, Derek's guest is none other than our own Frank Creed:

CHRISTIAN and cyberpunk are two words that don’t usually appear in the same sentence. Thanks to author Frank Creed, we may soon see them together on a regular basis.

Frank is the author of the startlingly inventive speculative fiction novel FlashPoint: Book 1 of the Underground, described by some as The Matrix with a Christian worldview. That’s not quite accurate, but it gives you an idea of the attitude and action in Flashpoint.

We talked about Frank’s background, his vision, why he writes, and for whom.

Listen to the show here: http://www.pidradio.com/?p=434

News for June 19th, 2009

Helena Lehman says:

Listen to my one-hour Live Interview with Bruce Collins on his Big Finale Internet Radio Show this Friday, June 19th at 7pm PST (8 pm MST, 9pm CST, 10pm EST). For information about the show, go to: http://pillar-of-enoch.com/media/Interview6-19-09.html

Donna Sundblad says:

Check out my guest post at Dayana Knight's blog http://dayanaknight.blogspot.com/2009/06/please-welcome-donna-sundblad-author-of.html. It's called "The Why Behind Setting" and gives insight into developing a secondary world in fiction writing.

Derek Gilbert says:

The audio book edition of The God Conspiracy is currently ranked #4 in the Podiobooks.com Top Ten.

Here's the link: http://www.podiobooks.com/title/the-god-conspiracy/

News for June 17th, 2009

Mike Lynch says:
Amy Deardon interviewed Brandon and I about the release of our first novel, "When the Sky Fell." You can check it out at: http://amydeardon.blogspot.com/


Rick Copple says:
This afternoon, the voting is supposed to be activated for the New Covey
Awards, of which Transforming Realities is in the running. It is a
contest to judge cover art, so it provides some exposure for the book
and the artist involved.
http://thenewcoveycoverawards.blogspot.com/2009/06/entry-14-transforming-realities.html
If you have the time and inclination, I'd appreciate checking it out and
if you so deem worth, casting a vote, as I think EJ did a terrific job
on the cover. So for his sake, I'm hoping this ranks up high in the vote
count. The voting ends 6/30.