Heart-warming news!
Because it's freezing down here in Tassie!
Three good things for you, my friends!
For those of you in the northern hemisphere, this is what my back yard currently looks like:
So I thought that we could use some heart-warming, book-related news 😊
(ps This may appear truncated in your email — please do check out everything till the very end via the link to view in browser!)
One
In Victrix will definitely be published on September 1st, come hell or high water!
Two
When writing stories about the meaning of care and compassion and utilising my favourite themes in mythology, the result was what one reviewer said “hits them in the feels.” You can read the opening scene of Mountain View here.
The other story for It Takes A Village deals with AI, a subject that I spend a lot of time there days. You can see my vision of the future here.
(The will also be an upcoming post on my professional blog about the ethics of AI, for the curious).
Three
I’m busy writing an introductory novella for a new series, a modern day police procedural dealing with occult crimes. The novella is set in Sydney, and I had fun researching the history of a particular street corner (one I used to walk in). This before the detective — DI Jack Finkel, Unusual Crimes— moves to Tasmania for some Outback Noir vibes.
Doing it this way allows me to explore the characters and build the world. For example, I was never satisfied with the trope of secret societies running magic away from the mundanes. Because humans can’t keep a secret, and if magic works then someone would have figured out how to profit from it.
Thus we have some interesting mechanics for both the magic and social systems, that explain how the magic works while the world is similar enough to our own. Conservation of energy applies, but accessing the sources of magical energy is harder than electrical engineering: chemical fireworks are easier to manufacture than magical fireballs, and adding CGI in post-production is even cheaper (sadly). So no spell-slinging cowboys, and the powerbrokers pulling the strings wear suits and sit on boards.
On the other hand, you can take Magical Studies at university (Jack did), which is sadly as glamorous as a degree in art history. It’s about as lucrative a career, too. Definitely not up there on Jack’s Jewish mother’s shortlist of either law or medicine, but better than theatre. Still, Magic is there, hard to practice but woven into every aspect of life.
Back to magical crimes, Jack likes to joke that we lost something when the various police criminal investigation branches got merged into the State Criminal Command of NSW. He’d much rather have the old days, when the division was called the Magical Investigation Branch — the MIB… Zero chance of getting that reinstated, not after the movie.
Criminals being what they are, where’s there’s a will there’s a way, and people come up with creative ways to take shortcuts. They occasionally end messily, which is where Jack steps in. The first case is set in Millers Point, The Rocks — Sydney’s oldest suburb. I’m bringing in history into the story, because it’s me and because it is foundational to the occult crime: can’t have a ghost — excuse me, “unprogressed spirit,” to use Jack’s politically-correct police jargon — story without it.
You can see some amazing 19th century paintings that I’ve used to locale research here, and here. There are old maps, and buried in a demolition book (a book of prints detailing impending demolitions in the first decade of the 20th century) what must be one of the most annoying photo-bombs.
Specifically, the story happens in a building to the left of where the steps are, even though the site has changed dramatically since this 1901/2 photograph:
You can see this house painted a couple of years later in a state of disrepair here. Or try and spot it a decade earlier in this painting. Or walk down that lane in this video, just like I used to on my lunch breaks when my office was close by, to see how it has changed. (Yeah, OK, maybe I researched more than I had to — but that’s the fun of writing!)
I’ll post the intro scenes after In Victrix is published (and I’ve had a chance to edit them properly). I’m also having Felix conduct the character interview for Jack, which is promising to be hilarious (for you; for me it’s likely to get slightly embarrassing).
That’s it for now! Three bits that I hope will engage an intrigue you. Check out It Takes A Village, but if you want some more reading material, check out the giveaways below (please click on then even if you don’t — it helps!)
