Category: fantasy

Free Noblebright Fantasy Books

If you enjoy wholesome fantasy that focuses on themes of courage, honor and nobility, then click on over here to peruse 70 free Noblebright fantasy books.

Noblebright is a somewhat new sub-genre of fantasy that started several years ago. Like I said, it tends to always have the themes I mentioned. It also avoids erotica. Mostly PG and PG-13, if you can equate it to movie ratings. Though, these days, there are a lot of PG-13s that honestly seem to veer into R territory.

The first book in my new Ruin Raiders series is in the giveaway, if you haven’t picked it up already. Seriously, it’s free–so what are you waiting for? Or, if you want to give me 99 cents (actually, I only get 35 cents of the 99–the rest goes to Amazon), go to Amazon and buy it there. After all, poor, struggling writers like myself need to be able to buy chewing gum every now and then.

Tunes and Writing

Some new tunes and some new writing. That’s what I have to show for myself today. If I had the freedom to do so, I’d spend most of my time writing songs and stories. However, life…

Life is messy. And persistent. After a while you become the metaphor for a hastily made-up sad clown failing at juggling dozens of chainsaws and Limoges porcelain while unskillfully riding a unicycle and trying to escape from a maddened mob of IRS agents, honey badgers and robotic squid armed with cusinarts. And, of course, while all this mayhem is happening, there is a beautiful slow motion sunset going on–so incredibly slow that that single sunset begins, evolves and dips down past the horizon just once for your entire life.

The sunset never ceases to amaze and awe you, every time you glance over during your frantic unicycle escape.

What’s the moral of this story? That life is short and time is even shorter and, if we firmly believe in the existence of the four dimensions of length, width, height and time, someone possesses a measuring tape in their pocket that exists outside of time but with which you can measure time. Or perhaps the object is simply a very, very tiny ruler. But still big enough to measure time.

New Inflatable Hippies Music!

Which brings me to my latest tune. Blackbird, as written by me and performed by alter ego band Inflatable Hippies and executed by hired AI studio musicians. I simply cannot perform and record at their level. Plus, I find myself content enough to just write the song. Also, for the video clip below, I tried to put together some AI lip-sync of a portion of the song. I used some Magica tools to rough success. Definitely not perfect.

Which brings me to my latest tune. Blackbird, as written by me and performed by alter ego band Inflatable Hippies and executed by hired AI studio musicians. I simply cannot perform and record at their level. Plus, I find myself content enough to just write the song.

New Humorous Epic Fantasy!

And… the latest story. The Ruin Raiders series. Books 1 and 2 are out. Book 1 is Rise of the Farmboy, and book 2 is Westward to Ravelock. The series follows the story of a farmboy named Ben who runs away from home in order to find adventure. And, boy oh boy, does he ever find adventure. Way too much. He ends up joining a ruin raiding crew who plunder old ruins to find treasure. Wizards, elves, dwarves, monsters, magic, ancient evil, etc etc etc. All of the above.

3 through 6 should be out shortly as well. This is fairly lighthearted writing, in comparison to the Hawk and His Boy series. I wrote Hawk very carefully, as I was deliberately trying to examine themes of sacrifice, death, family and truth. I rewrote and edited those three books for years before I was content enough to publish. Ruin Raiders is the exact opposite: quick, fun, write and move on. Another thing to note is that the Ruin Raiders book exist in the same world as The Fury Clock, but they aren’t written from such a complete lunatic perspective as Clock is.

All for now. I have to get back to land use and water policy. California.

New Humorous Fantasy Book

The new humorous fantasy book is almost ready to publish. That is… as soon as the artistic combat between myself and the cover is concluded, I will publish. However, I’m not sure who is winning the battle at this point. Here’s a truncated look at the current version, minus the lettering and a big portion of the image. This should be enough to give you an idea of the stylistic feel of the story: light-hearted, humorous fantasy, leaning heavily on the farm boy trope.

I’m determined to get this one published before the end of the month. As long as the rest of life doesn’t intrude too aggressively: family, church, job, water policy, satellite crashing to Earth, etc.

In the Meantime, Here’s Some Music

In other creative fronts, I’ve been reproducing a lot of my old songs via my Inflatable Hippies alter-ego band. I have way too much fun doing this. I think I first started writing music when I was around twelve or thirteen, and I’ve always been engaged in that to varying degrees ever since. You’ll have to pry my guitar from my cold hands before you put me in the grave.

Mary is about soldiers going to war and not coming home. That was my grandfather in my family during WWII, but it’s a common experience to many. Sad theme, but definitely worth exploring in any creative medium. I’ve always been fascinated by WWII and Cold War history. Music is a quick way to integrate that creatively. That said, I have several book projects I’m chipping away on that use WWII/Cold War as a context. Part of my list of about thirty books I need to write…

Charlie’s Road is about someone trying to find meaning in life and not understanding that you can always find that right at home. Right where you are, of course. I wrote this one from the perspective of a love story, but also managed to work in an Ozymandia allusion for the Percy Shelley afficionados–I love that poem and have worked it into quite a few different things I’ve written.

Anticipation of Impact is an old song about the lie we tell ourselves, that we’re in control of our lives. We’re mostly not. If I remember correctly, I wrote this after being in a car accident. For days and months afterward, I would have sudden moments where I thought something was about to collide with me. My mind would freeze up in anticipation of the impact.

Life Has Come Undone is more deliberation on that same theme–the lack of control we have in life, combined with the persistent sense of not being able to find our way home, even when at home. I don’t know about you, but that odd sense of homesickness is something that’s persisted through my life, regardless of a happy home life here in Planet California. I suppose it’s because of the innate longing we all have (at least, I hope you all have it) for heaven. That’s the only explanation that makes sense to me.

I’m Off to Punk Rock Land

Those are the new ones for now. Recently, however, I’ve started writing songs veering off into punk rock. It’s a fun, energetic style (and no, I’m not growing a mohawk) and I love the inherent protest feel it has. Plenty of things to protest these days. Such as the horrifying abuse issue in the UK recently highlighted by Rupert Lowe’s report. 250,000 Girls is the song I wrote for that.

Sanderson and Apple

Interesting to see that Brandon Sanderson and Apple have signed a deal to bring some of his works to screen. It’s even more interesting to see that Sanderson has secured the right to control the process, from writing scripts, controlling creative approvals, casting, etc. That’s a relief, as Hollywood is incredibly adept at ruining book adaptations.

Sanderson is probably one of the few authors alive on the planet with the power to get that kind of deal. I suppose JK Rowling is also in that tiny demographic, along with… that’s about it.

Mistborn and the rest of the Cosmere books are unique, creative stories. Sanderson, whether you like his writing or not, has a very distinct vision; it’s a very comprehensive vision, given the complexity and integration of his stories within the massive framework of the Cosmere world he’s created. I enjoy his writing quite a lot, though I had some trouble getting through the Stormlight Archives.

The thought of turning that body of work over to the shiny suits in Hollywood-land is disturbing. I’m still shuddering over what Amazon did to Tolkien’s legacy with their Rings of Power series (I began shuddering over a year ago). Though, to be fair, my teenage boys enjoy the series and have watched it at least three times now. They claim it stays faithful to Tolkien, which means we have recurring arguments about this every now and then (I think I always win the arguments, but the boys think they always win–my wife stays out of the fray).

Another fantasy coming to screen is Brandon Mull’s Fablehaven. Angel Studios secured that property and apparently is in pre-production. My middle son loves this series–so, for his sake, please don’t mess it up, Angel Studios.

Sanderson and Stormlight

I finally got around to reading The Way of Kings, the first book in Brandon Sanderson’s Stormlight Archives series. I have a vague memory of picking it up about ten years ago, reading a few chapters and then not finishing it for some reason. Maybe got called to jury duty?

Anyway, I’m glad I opened the book again. Clear and engaging plot, fascinating (though slightly confusing) magic system, great world-building, intriguing mysteries built into the story that pulled me along, several compelling characters spread throughout the different threads, and a strong command of the English language.

All in all, that equates to a good book. As opposed to a tedious, dreary, poorly written book–of which there are many. Many, as in scads of ’em.

The other thing I appreciate about Sanderson is that he doesn’t present you with hero characters that are virtually indistinguishable from villains. Stories like that are dreary. Stories should not dip us into psychological middens due to the detestability of their heroes.

Don’t Get Me Wrong…

Yes, don’t get me wrong–I have no patience with perfect Mary Sue characters. Heroes need flaws, just as the flaw-filled life is inescapable for all of us. A hero with flaws is relatable and honest in terms of genuinely representing reality. But a so-called hero who is so overwhelmingly flawed that, after a few dozen pages, you realize, “Wait a second… this hero is actually Heinrich Himmler.” Or similar.

Sanderson doesn’t engage in that post-modern, nihilist nonsense with his heroes. Thank God for that. Otherwise, cats everywhere would be distressed. If they read books. If they are not fans of nihilism. And I don’t think cats are. Discuss further with your cat.

Kaladin, Dalinar and Shallan are the three characters that propel the threads through the overall weave of the story. All three of them are flawed, all three of them are admirable in different ways, all three of them compel empathy.

Obviously, as probably a lot of you know, Sanderson has a bit of a habit of killing off main characters (see: Mistborn). This makes me nervous, as there are still four more books in the Stormlight Archives series that I haven’t read. Four huge books. Do it if you must, but you better have a really good reason for doing so, and you had better have some other characters weaving in that command just as much empathy and respect from your reader. Which is me. And countless others.