Greetings from Stately Wilson Manor
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What’s Happening?
I’m going to avoid writing about what is happening because it makes me literally ill to think about it, and no one needs me to go on about the state of the world. I’ll say in short I did not have invading foreign countries illegally to steal resources while our elected congress sits on its collective ass on my “in my lifetime” Bingo Card.
Dedicated to being more productive this year. You can only use “everything sucks” as an excuse for so long. My agent has Tattered Remnants, which will likely be the first in a series featuring Monica Vasquez, a detective with an eidetic memory, Lucien Vanderslice, orphan, bookbinder, recluse, and Tommy Doyle, the Psychos ‘r’ Us Detective. Book one is on submission and book two is about 7000 words, waiting.
In the meantime, I’m working through the first edit of Coyne House, my big horror novel (big as in, 120,000 words plus in first draft). Should get that to Trish for first edits this month, and then it goes off to the agent. There is also a side-project for someone else that is taking some time, but making some money, and that is the way of the world.
Short fiction just out in The Wicker Yule: A Horror Anthology edited by Alex S. Johnson with my story “I’ll Have a Deep Blue Christmas,” and stories/poetry from Billy Martin (Poppy Z. Brite), Jeffrey Thomas, Sandy Deluca and more, along with profiles and interviews.
Upcoming stories in Exquisite Corpus: Tales and Poems in the Vein of Poppy Z. Brite to benefit Billy and Grey Anatoli Cross, with contributions from Peter Straub (Ghost Story), Caitlin R. Kiernan, Christa Faust, and Bram Stoker Award winners David Niall Wilson (Deep Blue), Jonathan Maberry (V Wars), and L.L. Soares (Life Rage). Two yet-to-be announced anthology projects from a favorite publisher, and in Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap: A Literary Tribute to Revenge.
You can find the promo here with lots of other free books to download and check out for 2026. Build that TBR pile!
From Writing What Hurts – The Navy Years Continued
Two formative things happened during my time at Great Lakes. One was my introduction to Dungeons & Dragons. Long afternoons, weekends, all-nighters, chasing dark lords and evil clerics. We had a good dungeon master, but I can’t remember his name. I remember that Brian played some of the time, but that period (for me) is a screen of faces without names and memories of portable holes and gelatinous cubes. We did have a girl who played along for a while, and I remember finding it very odd, because she was smart, and attractive, and could have been out doing anything she wanted with whoever she wanted – and chose to fight goblins with geeks.
Later in life, my experiences with that game would land my station wagon in Lake Geneva (shortly after meeting Gary Gygax at the original Dungeon) – and in contracts with White Wolf and their World of Darkness, where I produced a long string of novels that I am still proud of. I’m not always proud of what I’ve written in the past – though I usually am right up until, for some reason, I go back and read it. Writing is an endeavor where the words (from a writer) “You Can’t Go Home Again,” are very true. (Thank you Thomas Wolfe). I recommend, if you want to continue to be productive and creative, that you concentrate on what you are doing, and not too much on what you’ve done, aside from marketing it. Too many authors from my own generation, and those before, have simply stopped writing and are seemingly confused why they can’t continue to make lots of money selling things they wrote years ago with nothing new to offer. Sort of self-explanatory, unless your fandom is in the millions, and movies are being made from your old books.
But I digress. Random memories from that time in Great Lakes include an instructor staring at the wall, where he’d hung a poster that said: “The only Stupid Question is the One Not Asked,” for a very long time. Gary Clark (who I still need to explain) was from Beaufort, Texas. He had just asked this instructor, during our module on transmitters, if turning the radio on its side would cause the electrons to flow down to the side, instead of taking their normal path. It was impossible to tell from his ridiculous grin if he was serious.
Clark is responsible for my liking beer. When I was young, and I covered my stepfather much earlier in this book, I was given beer. It was a “hee hee” moment for Bob… my brother Bill gulped it down and loved it, but I hated it. It’s possible I hated it not only because I was a child trying beer, but also because it was godawful beer. Probably Goebel’s or Ballantine. The taste was so bad to me that, for over a decade I couldn’t even think about it. I did not have the same trouble with wine, or whiskey sours, but those are different stories.
Clark decided one day that I was going to learn to drink beer. He took me to the club on base and sat me down by the pool tables. We were both good at pool and played regularly. I had brought my own pool stick in a black case – a sad young sailor attempt at being cool that many have emulated over the years. Clark said, “I’m going to get us some beers.”
When he came back, he had two pitchers. No glasses. He gave me the same grin he’d given the instructor when he asked his question (by definition, not a stupid question once asked). It was Shlitz. At first I hated it, but it was cold, and we were playing pool.
I do not remember much about that night. I remember the next morning, though. I had only a mild hangover, but I did not have any idea how I’d gotten into my barracks room. There were two more pool cue cases leaning against the wall next to mine. I had very little time to put it all away, shower, brush the hellish taste (and likely breath) from my teeth, and get to class.
Clark was there, grinning (because of course he was). It seems we’d both won pool cues off unsuspecting sailors with either more beer, or inferior skills. There were more than the initial two pitchers, at least one more shared… there were stories that were in all likelihood made up on the spot, but that I could not deny or prove to be false. I wondered if the neurons in my brain had flowed down toward my face when I hit the pillow, and I glanced at the poster on the wall.
I graduated near the top of my class in ET “A” school. It was time to move on to something new… real computers, satellite navigation, and San Diego California (again). But first, a couple of chapters on writing. – To Be Continued.
My novel Deep Blue is featured this month as a free download. You just need to sign up for my newsletter to get it, and don’t worry – if you are already signed up and saw it here, signing up again to get the book won’t double your e-mail. The link is below.
What I’m Reading
Currently reading: On Kindle, Blood of the Witness Tree by J. C. Vande Zande – picked it up from a post on Bluesky, just so you know that some of us actually buy and read one another’s books. About 20% in and enjoying this one.
Listening to the audiobook of Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker. Not far enough to say anything other than it is immediately nothing like my mind sort of pictured it, and in a good way.
What I’m Watching
Watched and enjoyed the final season of Stranger Things and we loved finale was a great wrap-up. Will miss that one, but glad they didn’t push it to a point where sharks were jumped. Finished the season of Pluribus. Watched several truly forgettable horror movies, and also BUGONIA with Emma Stone which was… a lot.
Watched and loved: Headless: A Sleepy Hollow Story, The Life of Chuck.
Watched and didn’t hate: Ghost Babe
Just starting: Copenhagen
Free Books for Signing up to the NL:
You can find those pages here. DEEP BLUE / HEART OF A DRAGON
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