Hi all,
It’s been much too long since I last updated folks with news on me, but unfortunately (and fortunately) life often intrudes. But there’s been a lot of great stuff (and a few curveballs) over the past couple of months, and I wanted to get everyone up to speed now:
1. My writing has proceeded steadily, with a number of new things to report. First, the Time Traveled Tales anthology (a major Kickstarter success back in the summer), including my short story “Sanction,” has finally been released! It’s available in E-book form from Amazon and the Silence in the Library website, and I have a couple of copies if you’re interested in getting a signed paperback or hardcover copy directly from me–you can get in touch with me directly using my Contact page. Volume 2 of TTT should be out in the next few months, and the Heroes anthology not too long thereafter. I’m also finishing work on a short story for the 2014 Origins anthology, and have another couple of invites on the horizon which I’m not yet at liberty to talk about (but hope to soon). In editing news John Helfers and I are still working on our politics and fantasy/science fiction anthology, and we hope to have good news to share on that front soon.
I’m happy to report that longer projects are also going well. I’m querying agents and publishers with my third novel Grayshade and a non-fiction project, and working on my fourth novel at the same time. But in the immediate future I’m most excited about my Icarus project: my second novel is being turned into a graphic novel, illustrated by professional comics artist Matt Slay and published by Silence in the Library, masterminds behind four extremely successful Kickstarters to date. The Kickstarter for Icarus will go live on January 14th, and I already have a number of appearances planned to support it. The art is gorgeous, and I’m very proud of the story…and given what Brad Beaulieu and I have discovered in recent months when interviewing authors about their experiences with Kickstarters, along with the buzz surrounding this work, I’m extremely excited and can’t wait for the 14th to get here. Stay tuned to this site for more details over the next couple of weeks!
2. I’m finalizing the details on 2014’s conference schedule, and it looks to be a doozy–Farpoint in Baltimore in February, Norwescon in Seattle in March, Ad Astra in Toronto in April, Origins in Columbus in June, Readercon in Boston in July, Gen Con in Indianapolis in August and World Fantasy in Washington, DC in November, plus one or two more which are still up in the air. It all adds up to a lot of travel, but I’m excited for all of it, and I’m looking forward to speaking to people about my various new writing projects…and even playing a game or two when I get the chance.
3. Speculate!, the podcast I co-host with Brad Beaulieu, is finishing its third year of production, which is a little hard to believe. But we’re going strong with recent shows on the work of Lauren Beukes, Scott Lynch and Pat Rothfuss, and we’ve been starting to attract a solid amount of critical notice–we hope it continues to grow as well as it has been, and in the meantime we’re having a great time with it!
4. Finally, life continues apace. My wife just officially got her clinical social work license, which is a big step for her, and her mom has moved out to the NYC area and been a big help with our daughter…who is in kindergarten, just lost her first tooth and is an amazing, wonderful kid. It’s honestly a privilege to be her father. Teaching has been going very well for me (halfway through my eleventh year at St. John’s, which is hard to fathom!), and I’m enjoying myself there. Life did manage to throw me a few wrinkles over the past six weeks: I landed in the hospital with an outbreak of atrial fibrillation, which for someone whose sum total of personal hospital experience dates from twenty-five years ago (about four hours while my wisdom teeth were being removed) was frankly terrifiying. The good news is that my heart is apparently in great shape and no serious red flags were discovered during a battery of tests run on me, but it still meant a hospital stay and a routine procedure to get the heart back in rhythm–which, again, scared the heck out of me. It was a sobering experience for me, but I feel very glad to have apparently *knock on wood* made it through okay, and I’ve been very, very aware of how lucky I am during this holiday season. I didn’t need the reminder, but boy did I get one!
On the whole, though, it was a great, busy and full 2013, and I’m looking forward to an even better 2014. As always, thanks so much for your interest, love and support, and best wishes for the rest of your holidays–stay tuned to this site for more, and I’ll catch you in 2014!
Happy New Year,
Greg
