Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai


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P.C. Hodgell on writing

God-Stalk-P.-C.-HodgellI am having a wonderful time reading the God Stalker books by P.C. Hodgell1, and it was ages since I had enjoyed a fantasy series so much. Sprawling is a word that comes to mind, but in a good way.
P.C. Hodgell therefore went straight into my short list of authors whose technique I admire, and whose skills I’d love to emulate.

So, fueled by my fanboy-ish enthusiasm, I did a little search on YouTube, and found these two snippets of interview, that I think I am going to share.
Always interesting, listening to writers talking about their work.
I hope you’ll like ‘em, and maybe check out her books.

  1. in case you are interested, you can get the first four in the series as two hefty paperbacks by Baen books. The covers are nothing to write home about, but you are not buying books for their covers, right? ↩


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Change the world with music

No, this is not a post about some 1970s disco extravaganza.
75168In a post about the late Robert F. Young a few days back I mentioned his influence on a Japanese anime called RahXephon.
I was first interested in the thing when it was described to me as Evangelion’s smarter brother.

Confessions of an Anime viewer: I was never able to get Neon Genesis Evangelion. I know it was a huge success and a smash hit and all that, but I tried it and I did not like it.
The fact that there were at the time self-styled otakus shouting ceaselessly about how the series was better than anything that had gone before and anything that would come afterwards sort of cooled my already not-very-hot enthusiasm.

But RahXephon came with that comment, the reference to Robert F. Young’s masterful short story The Dandelion Girl and the discovery that it was somehow related to Churchward’s work about the lost continent of Mu.

So I gave it a try, and while I still have some misgivings, I’ll admit I was positively impressed. I do not normally cover anime on this blog, but once in a while, during the Silly Season… why not? Continue reading →


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Asteria and the Sun King

The third Adventure of Asteria is out, and got some pretty good feedback from my beta readers.
You can currently download the epub, mobi and PDF file of Asteria in the Court of the Sun King from Gumroad, and within 72 hours the file will be also available on Amazon.

asteria 3

I hope you guys enjoy this, the first completely new Asteria story in over two years.
It’s good to be back.


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Doing the pulp thing

True to the pulp rule that stories should be kept doing the rounds until they sell1, I got a rejection slip at 8 am, and by 10 am I had revised and sent the story to another publisher.
It’s a very short, quirky piece and should make me no more than fifty bucks, but that’s no excuse for it to be idle.
Run, little story, and please do your best to impress the editor!

  1. I think it was Bob Heinlein who said that. ↩