In this highly-anticipated sequel to Sorcery for Beginners, a diverse team of teenage sorcerers travels the globe, rescuing magical creatures from the evil Euclideans.
I am alive! Anything you heard to the contrary is false. No, JF Dubeau did not kill me off in his upcoming sequel. I just have had a really tough couple of years and I didn’t keep up with much of what I probably should have.
In the spirit of keeping things short and sweet, pertinent updates:
I will be at Dragoncon. If you can make it by, reach out to me so I can say hi. If you have your copy and it isn’t already signed, I’ll sign it!
Fall is 50% done being edited by me. If you haven’t, you should probably get your copy pre-ordered today!
I’ve got other ideas that have been percolating, but that’s the important stuff for now.
First: thank you, thank you, and thank you for following this project. I really, sincerely, genuinely appreciate it and I can’t wait for you to see more.
Second: I’m posting this to inform you all that I’ve uploaded a promo-video-thing to the BREATHLESS story-page, which I think turned out pretty darn good. Author Ed Kurtz (Bleed, The Rib From Which I Remake the World) provided original voice-work and HE. ABSOLUTELY. NAILED IT. Check it out and let me know what you think. Happy reading, and remember what your ol pal Shane says: LIVE WELL, and LIVE SLOW
--Shane
Reviews on Goodreads and Amazon are nice. I’m just saying.
Dear friends and followers,
The ebook download links for "A Gentleman’s Murder" were sent out today. I am currently at the Inkshares office signing the books for those of you who ordered print copies during the funding campaign. Those should be shipped out tomorrow--a little later than I’d have liked, but you can’t have everything.
We’re nearly there! It’s been a long road, and I hope you’ll enjoy this story, almost as much as I hope you’ll tell the world about it. Your voice counts for something in this world, and your honest opinion would mean a great deal to me.
As noted above, reviews on Goodreads and Amazon are wonderful things.
Hi Folks!
Guess what? It’s been exactly one year today since The Punch Escrow was published and my life forever changed. The book has now been translated into several languages and I’ve been afforded the opportunity to travel around the world and meet with readers—something I would never have imagined. The process is still in effect! The Korean translation is being published next month.
My little passion project went on to get starred reviews on Kirkus, Library Journal, and Foreword Reviews—where it ultimately was awarded their Gold Award for best indie sci-fi book of 2017.
I wanted to take this time to thank you all, again. Thank you for making this possible. This adventure has been nothing short of amazing. I apologize for not personally replying to the many questions many of you have sent me about the film adaptation. It’s just that I don’t really have anything new to report. I’m in weekly communications with the film’s producers, but—as I’m discovering firsthand—it’s hard to make a movie. I promise to share movie updates as soon as anything solid happens on that front.
As for the sequel. Well, I have the whole thing pretty much outlined. I can tell you the working title is The Hash Collision. That’s news, I guess! I’m holding off putting pen to paper until Lionsgate finalizes the first book’s film adaptation so that I don’t risk breaking serious continuity with the sequel (some things will inevitably be different, but I don’t want to write major plot points in the sequel for characters that somehow end up dying in the film adaptation of The Punch Escrow).
Last: In case you missed it. I’ve had a short story published in the Hugo and Nebula award winning Apex Magazine. It’s called Kerouac’s Renascence, and I invite you to read it. You’ll find it’s a very different tale than Punch.
My deepest gratitude and well wishes,
Tal
Well, folks, we’re due for an update, and I have some good news.
We’ve passed the 500 pre-orders mark!
We’re at 510 right now, with 40 days left ‘til our goal. That means we only need to sell 240 more copies to get Proteus its publication deal. We are over two-thirds of the way there.
Unfortunately, this has been a much busier summer than I expected it to be, so progress has been slow the past couple of weeks. I’m gearing up for a super intense August, but it’s still going to take every scrap of support I can gather from now until the campaign’s end. We should be getting approximately 6 pre-orders a day to stay on target, which is no easy thing to do when I’ve already asked everyone I know for support. This is why now, more than ever, I’m dependent on you all to get the word out. If each of you could find just one person who’d be interested in supporting this book, we’d absolutely crush our goal I cannot stress enough how much I can’t do this without your help.
It may feel like we’ve been treading water this entire time, but we are truly making progress that we should all be proud of.
I’ll leave you this week with another lore update. In the spirit of the long and agonizing stasis this campaign has endured, let’s take a look at the technology the Somnambule uses to keep its 50,000 colonists safely preserved during her 150 year journey. Cold stasis is gruelling, painful, and invasive, but just like our campaign for Proteus, it’s a necessary hell with a paradise on the other side.
So the several year long journey of getting Ghosts of War: Retribution to publication day has finally come to an end. Many, many hours of writing and editing and deadlines and design and planning and crowdfunding and...
I got a cold on release day, proceeded to be wiped out, and forgot to do an update...
Go me.
But fear not! The book is just as released today as it was yesterday and here are three simple things you can do to help the book as it takes it’s first steps into the wider world.
1. Read it!
Unsurprisingly the first step is to actually read the book. If you haven’t yet received your print copy (they’re on the way!), you should be able to download the ebook from the Inkshares website. If you haven’t bought it yet, and would like to here are a few places you can do that:
Physical
Ebook
2. Leave reviews!
The next step is to head over to Amazon and Goodreads and leave your reviews. I believe the magic number is 50 reviews for Amazon before it does something magical with their algorithms. So lets aim for 50.
Every review helps grow the books profile, and will help to get it in front of more peoples eyes.
3. Tell some people about it! (or everyone even)
Spread the word. Tell people about the book. Encourage them to buy a copy (and leave a review!)
-------------
I think that’ll do for the moment. Lastly though, I want to thank everyone that helped make this thing a reality, you’re all awesome. It still feels weird. It still doesn’t feel real. But I am a published author today (er, yesterday) because of all of you.
I do really need to go lie down now though.
Hello Friends,
I have not reached out to you via Inkshares in a while. These days, I send updates through my monthly newsletter, but since I noticed a flurry of new followers I thought it was a good time to send you a quick message. If you want to subscribe to my newsletter sign up here. It is a monthly thing, no spamming at all.
A lot has happened in the past months. I finished and delivered to Inkshares the manuscript for my second novel Bad Medicine, I teamed up with a group friends to create an audio drama called Mermaids of Merrow’s Cove, and I also finished the sequel for The Catcher’s Trap, Worlds Walker.
I still don’t know how Worlds Walker will be published, though. I learned the hard way that it is hard to run a crowdfunding campaign when the people who supported you with a previous campaign have not received the book they were promised yet –in this case Bad Medicine- so Worlds Walker will be on stand by for now.
I’m in no rush, thought. After publishing The Catcher’s Trap I learned that patience is a virtue an author must have. Few books become instant best sellers, few authors get movie deals after one or two novels. The process of building a career in literature is long but, so far, incredibly rewarding.
A project that I think you should check out is my audio drama. Mermaids of Merrow’s Cove is a weekly murder mystery. Think Law and Order SVU meets The X-Files. The series take place in a small coastal town in New England and it follows Emma Kersey’s investigation of a mysterious woman that may or may not be a mermaid. The six episodes are out and I recommend you binge on them. Visit my website for the many ways in which you can listen to it www.ricardophenriquez.com
I fell in love with audio drama. What started as a quick fun project to work on while I waiting for Bad Medicine to go into production, became a real passion. The team I worked with is eager to start working on a second season, so I’m getting ready to start writing a new script.
What can I say, my creative life is moving in many new and exciting directions and that feels great.
If you are a recent follower, check my projects on Inkshares. I’m always eager to hear feedback and comments from readers and authors.
Worlds Walker
Continue enjoying your summer my friends.
Best
Your friendly neighborhood queer author
Hi Readers!
I come bearing some pretty great news. As of this week, The Phantom Forest is being moved from the Quill collection to the "full" Inkshares catalog. So, what does this mean?
Well, first of all it’s an awesome opportunity! Quill is a limited release platform, in which I had to do a lot of the marketing/design legwork myself, or hire outside vendors. The bump up to the Inkshares catalog basically means the book will get greater marketing/publicity support, more reviews, updated artwork, and likely an additional pass with their fantastic in-house editor. The best news is that we are still shooting for the same release date - November 13th! There’s a lot to do before then, but the team is working hard and I’m hopeful we will pull it off.
Now, how did this happen? Because wonderful people like YOU started telling everyone how much you loved this book, and the Inkshares team listened. The Phantom Forest will enjoy a wider release and become accessible to even more readers because you made your voices heard. I am SO thankful I can’t even think straight.
This will likely be my last update on the Inkshares website, as I’m going to move everything over to an email listserv. Next time ya’ll hear from me, I’ll have many more details about this new and exciting process!
Thanks again everyone - this is truly a reader-driven platform and it appears the readers have spoken. You’re truly the best!
Liz
It’s Pub Day!
I’ve been having a blast all day talking up the book, hosting games and giving out prizes, watching the reviews come trickling in. I almost forgot to ping you all and let you know the book is officially out there. Published. For reals. We actually ran OUT of books, if you can believe it. Multiple outlets are out of stock of the paperbacks, that’s how well today has gone. I am told that if you order them Ingram will print them to order, so if you’re looking to get a physical copy, ordering from Amazon or walking into a brick and mortar store will probably be your best bet.
And once you have read the book, please consider leaving a review. That would be super cool. So far readers are loving the book. It’s got five stars on Amazon and Goodreads, but the more the merrier, so please consider taking the time to toss a review up on your platform of choice.
I’m beat. It’s been a long, amazing day. I love you all.
May the Code replicate Eternal.