A few bits and pieces while I take a few minutes off from the tough work of waiting for the apple pie to be ready.
Vertigo!
I trawl around WordPress’ selection of blog themes every so often and sometimes preview one or two of them, but the new “Vertigo” theme is the first one that caught my eye as much as my previous one did. Improvement, or not? Let me know in the comments.
Black Library!
I am reminded by some chatter elsewhere online that my Necromunda novel Junktion is now available as part of a new omnibus of Underhive stories from BL’s print-on-demand line. Accompanying it are two other novels from that setting: Survival Instinct, a tale of Mad Donna Ulanti by gaming overfiend Andy Chambers, and C S Goto’s Salvation, for my money one of the most enjoyable and literary of the Necromunda books. Also in there are a trove of Necromunda shorts going back to the old INFERNO! days including “Badlands Skelter’s Downhive Monster Show!”, my first ever professional sale.
If you want to know more about it, check out this review from the MIT Science Fiction Society from when the book first came out. And if that puts you in a review-reading mood, here’s one for the Enforcer omnibus that I really liked. Not just because it says nice things, although it does and I appreciate them, but because it’s a real buzz to see how the reviewer just gets so much of what I was thinking about and trying to do with the Calpurnia stories. It’s very cool to get a reader who’s so much on the same wavelength like that. (One small thing, though: the recycling of the Crossfire artwork for Legacy is something Amazon did for their page and never corrected. Legacy does have its own cover art.)
Roller Derby!
As I write this (probably, more or less), Canberra’s own Vice City Rollers are kicking arse at the Eastern Region Roller Derby, where they have apparently racked up two decisive victories out of two matches. Much congratulation for our all-star team, and while we count down the fortnight to the next CRDL match (Brindabelters vs Surly Griffins, see you there!), we’ve got some highlights from the last high-octane bout available courtesy of Channelvision. Here’s the first half, here’s the second half, with a tip of the hat to Roulette Rouge for the link.
Pie’s ready. Gotta go.
Hey Matthew that is an amazingly detailed review and he really does seem to get what you were trying to do. I’d love to see another Shira Calpurnia novel. Why don’t you try for a prequel if you feel there is nothing more to say after Blind. I loved Blind and probably for the reasons the reviewer says. It gave me an amazing insight into her character and what it meant to be an Aribites facing judgement. Just in that moment you got it down pat. I’m also happy to see that Junktion is being released in ebook. However, that does not mean you can be slack…write damn it!
PS I like the new site layout. Threw me for a bit. You owe me a link btw.
Ooh, I love those reviews.
I can’t wait to get my hands on the Necromunda Omnibus, too…
Finally, I do think that I preferred the old blog skin. That one was calm and enveloping; this one is sharp, makeshift, and a bit too disorganized-looking, in my eyes.
Cheers for the feedback on the theme, Mossy, and I hope the omnibus is to your liking. I’ll keep messing with the themes when I have some time – I don’t want to make it a regular thing, but I don’t want to get stagnant either.
Just finished the Calpurnia omnibus, and thought I’d drop you a comment and say Crossfire and Legacy are easily my favourite 40K novels so far (closely followed by Blind, but the ending seemed a bit weaker). I find myself hoping for a fourth book in the series – Shira’s story feels unfinished, and I’d like to see what happens with her trial. Would the judges be merciful? Would they take her resolution of the Bastion affair into consideration and reinstate her? Or would they sentence her to death only for Zhow to step in at the last moment and commandeer her special skills in the service of the Inquisition? After all, it seems a shame for such an interesting character to expire after just three books…
Incidentally, it’s very refreshing to read a story where the driving forces are entirely human factors – I get rather tired of every book ultimately having to be about daemons, pus and Chaos. Very nicely done, and thanks for a great read!