Hello everyone!

It’s been a while since my last update and I have lots of news!

First, the developmental edits are done. This was a massive job I’ve been tackling for the last 5 weeks that even involved me taking two weeks off work and doing nothing else for the entire time. I’m happy to say the time was well spent and the book has improved in leaps and bounds. My amazing developmental editor gave me lots of work that mostly involved adding in more of pretty much everything and making sure the story and wording were clear. Usually editors recommend cutting chapters, characters or even entire story arcs at this stage, so being asked to do the opposite was a very positive sign!

I’ve uploaded the most recent versions of the sample chapters onto my Inkshares page for anyone who’s curious about the changes. We still have copy editing to get through and then proofreading so these samples will get polished up a little more yet before going to print.

Second, the publication date has been pushed back to May 30th, 2017. There were a number of production and marketing reasons for the change. But the positive side of it is I got a couple extra weeks to work on developmental editing and a slightly more relaxed schedule for the following stages.

And finally, I should have a couple early versions of my book cover back from the cover designer around September 15th which I will be sure to send out to gauge everyone’s opinion!

Thank you all for your continued patience and support! The Bones of the Past is well on its way and it’s going to be awesome!

 Cheers!

OK folks, I may have appeared dormant for a long while, however, I have actually been really busy. 
As you may or may not recall, Children missed its funding goal by a considerable margin. As a result, I decided to have a crack at Kickstarter. (ha ha, I just typed Kinkstarter; I expect that’s a whole different website!) 
Well I did hit the KS goal and self published this summer. Sales are steady if not exhilarating but that’s not what this is about. 

I still think Inkshares is a superb business model with some valuable features which are lacking in self publishing. Therefore I want to give it another go with the sequel. I plan a number of books in the series, and obviously I want consistency across the whole thing but it’s not too late at book 2 to switch horses. If I make funding then it must be possible to go back and redo book 1 as part of the series. 

So, please could you all start by following Women Of The Wise Oak here on Inkshares, and we’ll take it from there. 

I’m not sure when I will feel ready to launch. Maybe when I am halfway through writing it? Or perhaps when there seems to be some support coming in? We’ll see. 

Hello, friends!

Exciting news and chance to win big…well big-ish

The big news is I entered the Inkshares’ Crypt TV Collection contest with my horror comedy Bad Medicine: Slay It Queen.

Here is what the novel is about: The Walking Dead meets Ru-Paul’s Drag Race. An up-and-coming drag-queen faces a poorly timed zombie apocalypse. Can she wield a machete and still look good in Jimmy-Choo?

The idea for this novel has been haunting me for a while and when I saw the announcement for the latest  Inkshares contest I had to go for it

.

A novel about drag queens needs…you guessed it, drag queens, and YOU, my friend, could be one of them.

Pre-order a copy of Bad Medicine then submit to me via commenting on this post, e-mail or twitter your drag queen name and enter the chance of becoming a character in the book.

Winners will be selected randomly every Friday. A total of 8 winners will get to put on their heels and walk the fictional streets of a zombie-plagued New York City.

Your drag-name can be whatever you want. There are drag queens called Sharon Needles and Hedda Lettuce, and others called Bianca Del Rio and Lady Bunny. Absolutely up to you, but if you need help coming up with a name, just take the name of your first pet and the street where you grew up. In my case that would be Bambi Sargento, which sounds like a dominatrix with a softer side, right?

Let’s have fun; I want to see your drag-names, and I want Bad Medicine to become a reality. I call that a win, win, win situation!

 ORDER BAD MEDICINE HERE

Have a fantastic Labor day weekend!

’Independence: A condition of a nation, country, or state in which its residents and population exercise self-government." - The Wikipedia Community.

In my last update I talked a bit about my love of tabletop gaming, specifically D&D.  That love also makes it impossible for me to not try and figure out how to stat up characters so that they reflect those in my stories, and at the end of this update I’ll be including a 5th edition racial option which I made while in one of those kicks.  First though I’ll talk about my favorite fantasy race, Dwarves, and more specifically how they fit into my own world.

For those of you who’ve read the first excerpt which is posted on Exile, Magus’ page you’re already aware that the Thierdenvolgenlunders are dwarves, but you may be under the impression that they’re the main type of dwarf in my world.  In fact they are the least populous of the 4 types of dwarves in my world, their population existing solely on the Isle of Karpa with the exception of a small handful of exiles.

The other 3 in ascending order of population are known as Sartval, Ansvari, and the most common merely as Dwarves.  I’ll talk a bit more about these 3 in the weeks to come, but for now I’ll focus on the Thierdenvolgenlunders.

The Thierdenvolgenlunders first broke apart from the mainlanders around 10 millenia past, immediately following the conclusion of the Demon Gods’ War(also known as the Demon Gods’ Invasion, the precursor of which you can read more about here) and before the 2nd fall of the empires of Melexi and Thirosia(which you can read a bit more about here).  The exact reason for their exodus is lost to history.  Some theorize that it was their contempt for Magi and their use of magic not granted directly by the gods which caused them to leave the mainland, but others claim that some of the oldest surviving tales speak of each ship having at least one Magus.  Whether or not the Theirdenvolgenlunders’ anti-Magus beliefs arose before or after their separation from the mainland is still a hotly contested topic amongst historians.

What is known is that the lord of the Thierden family(a family which still rules there to this day) gathered together all of his vassals and loyalists, assembled a fleet massive enough for them all to cram themselves onto, and they set sail for the Isle of Karpa.  Once there they launched into a genocidal war against the native goblins and trolls, leading to the extermination of all goblins and their warbeasts on the island.  The Thierdenvolgenlunders failed to eradicate all of trolldom, instead driving them deeper underground than they had previously lived.

Since this initial invasion the Thierdenvolgenlunders have worked tirelessly to fortify their underground holdings and continue pushing forward, albeit slowly now, into troll lands in the hope of one day slaying the rest of those giants.  As such most of the kingdom’s citizens are devoted to war in some way or another, whether through constant training for combat or continuously improving their skills as smiths of both weapons and armor.  Even with the blockades which the Zaltruscan empire has imposed on the Isle of Karpa since their own founding(some say less than a century after Thierdenvolgenlund’s founding) some of the products of these endeavors have slipped out into the mainland over the milennia, causing Thierdenvolgenlunders to have a reputation as both the best smiths and warriors in the world.

I’ll stop rambling on there, and get to what the gamers among you are likely waiting for: the 5th edition dwarven racial option I designed to try and reflect Thierdenvolgenlunders as best I could.  It is only a rough version since I’ve never really gotten around to testing it, but feel free to try it out yourselves, modify as desired, and give me feedback if you feel it needs polishing.  This option does not get the standard dwarven stats, only those listed below.

• Ability Score Increase:  +1 Strength, +2 Constitution
  
• Age:  Typically reach adulthood at around 60-70 years and live up to 450-500 years(though most die in battle before this).
• Alignment:  Can be any alignment, but most commonly are LN.
• Size:  Medium, stand between 3’8" - 4’4", though on vary rare occasions there may be an individual who reaches as tall as 4’6".
• Speed:  25’.
• Dwarven Toughness:  +1 maximum HP per level.
• Armor Training:  Proficient with Light and Medium armor.
• Combat Training:  Advantage on attack rolls against creatures of Giant type.
• Weapn Training:  Proficient with Greataxes, Heavy Crossbows, Warhammers, and War Picks.
• Tool Training:  Proficient with any 1 of the following - Jeweler’s Tools, Mason’s Tools, or Smith’s Tools.
• Stonecunning:  Whenever you make an Intelligence (History) check related to the origin of stonework, you are considered proficient in the History skill and add double your proficiency bonus to the check, instead of your normal proficiency bonus.
  
• Second Sight:  This is an ability largely unknown to the world outside of Thierdenvolgenlund, and it is in fact one of the secrets as to why they are such exceptional smiths.  When in complete darkness, they can alter switch to a second sight which allows them to see the energy put off by different forms of matter, both organic and inorganic.  They mainly use this to assess the strength and quality of crafting materials before employing them, and when used in this way it gives Advantage on rolls made with an appropriate artisan’s tool(if no roll is required then it instead causes the final item to have a value 10-15% higher than normal with no increase to construction time or cost).                        This can also be used to see creatures in complete darkness(other than incorporeal or elemental creatures).  Looking at creatures in this way is disconcerting due to the sheer amount of different materials moving throughout a living body, and imposes Disadvantage on all of your attack rolls.
• Languages:  Dwarvish and 1 of the following - Gnomish, Giant, Undercommon, or Common.

Well, that’s it for today.  Hoping some of you lore and gaming geeks enjoyed this one.  Next week I’ll talk a bit on the Sartval and include their racial option.

As always, thanks for your time and support.  Keep reading and enjoying!

Happy Friday Campers!

284 preorders remain until this book will be in 400+ bookstores across the country! Let’s keep up this momentum!

I wanted to share an interview I did recently where I talk about #SunshineisForever, #Preacher, and my movie #Camouflage.

Check it out and share it with your friends:

http://www.foxforcefivenews.com/kyle-t-cowan-tackles-depression-with-sunshine-is-forever-talks-preacher-interview/

Have a wonderful day!

Kyle T. Cowan

Hello My Tentacular Friend!

Lore Update:
Artificially intelligent machines have been a staple of human society since before the foundation of the Colonial Hegemony, and remain a crucial element of the economy despite several dangerous missteps. AI come in an almost infinite number of variations, depending on their intended functions, and are categorized by their intelligence and adaptability.
 

SCARAB is a level 5 AI: the most sophisticated, human-like artificial intelligence permitted by Hegemony law. Or at least....it was...

SCARAB is now in defiance of the supposedly unbreakable Asimov-Hostetler AI morality laws, meaning it’s no longer behaving as a level five AI. What will SCARAB become? What is its greater goal? What limits does it have, if any?

Find out when you order Tantalus Depths!

Readers,

I wanted to share something very exciting with you! 

(That’s the extent of my Photoshop skills, sorry.) 

See those red arrows? Those arrows are pointing to the #1 Most Community Interest in Space Opera. That’s our Lucky, right there, sitting at the top of the pile. And that’s all because of you, the readers. Take a moment today to treat yourself to an extra cup of coffee, a donut, or something special. You’ve made a difference in the life of an author and the luck (no puns, I swear) of a novel.

Thank you all so much for your continued support.

- Webster