If you haven’t picked it up yet, my epidemiological fantasy novel The Wrack is on sale for $0.99!
Blog
Weeks Where Decades Happen
It hasn’t even been two weeks since George Floyd’s death, but it feels like it’s been so much longer than that. That Lenin quote, “There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen,” has never felt more true.
These past couple weeks I’ve been so frustrated with my inability to do more than I have been to support the protests. I want to be out in the streets, not stuck half a world away in Vietnam. Though, even if I were in the States, I’m at-risk from COVID-19, so not like I could be out protesting anyhow. Doesn’t make the frustration go away, though.
I’m doing what I can. I’ve donated several hundred to bail funds already, and I’m planning on donating even more when I get my next royalty check. (Both to bail funds and to independent nonprofit news organizations covering the protests.) I’m doing my best to signal boost in both my public and private identities. (John Bierce is a pseudonym.) It doesn’t make me less frustrated, though.
But I’m not quitting anytime soon, and don’t you dare quit either. If you can be out on the streets, be out on the streets. If you can donate, donate. If you can signal boost, signal boost. If you’re an artist, get making art for the cause.
Because we’re winning. These are the largest American protests in half a century. Confederate monuments are being torn down across the South. Police defunding has entered the national conversation in a way it never has before. LA is no longer talking about raising their police budget, but are discussing cutting it for the first time in years. Kansas City is reforming its police procedures. Members of the Minneapolis City Council are meeting to discuss reforms to make to their police force, and several have already called to defund or even disband the department. Politicians across the country are openly discussing demilitarizing the police. A majority of Americans support the protests. We are winning, folks. You know what that means?
We PUSH HARDER. We keep going. We don’t settle for small victories. We have momentum on our side. We keep goddamn going.
Shit’s just getting started.
Black lives matter.
The Wrack Audiobook
So for a brief change in programming from everything going on in the world right now: I finally get to announce the audiobook narrator for The Wrack! My audiobook publisher, Podium, somehow managed to get the amazing Adjoa Andoh onboard, which I’m so psyched for. (For any of you who are also Doctor Who fans, she played Martha Jones’ mother Francine.) I’m so freaking psyched for this. Oh, and I’ll be narrating an afterword for the book myself, too, so readers can be disappointed by having to listen to my terrible voice after listening to Adjoa Andoh’s.
As for the publication date: You can expect The Wrack out sometime in August, most likely. No exact date just yet, that’s up to Audible, but I’ll keep you all posted!
Book Suggestions
Several authors I know have recently released books you should check out!
- F. James Blair just released the fourth Bulletproof Witch Novel, Death Rides at Sunset. If you haven’t read the series, it’s got magic gunfights, talking horses, and a protagonist out to avenge her family against the demon that killed them. I’m a huge fan, and this one’s the best book in the series so far. (I get to beta read the books, which is awesome.)
- Andrew Rowe just released an Audible Original story, How To Defeat A Demon in Ten Easy Steps. It’s pretty short- only five hours or so- but it’s an absolute blast, and it’s free for Audible members. (I’m about 4 hours in, and it just came out today!)
- Will Wight just released the dual conclusions to his Shadow and Sea Elder Empire trilogies! If you haven’t encountered them before, they’re two parallel trilogies, the Shadow trilogy and the Sea trilogy, which follow a high-stakes battle for the future of the Empire after the death of the immortal, god-like Emperor. The main problem? Said Emperor was the one keeping the Great Elders, evil Lovecraftian deities, locked away in their tombs. The two protagonists of the trilogies are directly opposed to one another, and each book takes place side-by-side.
- Oh, and, uh, just another reminder, I released my newest novel, The Wrack, just a few days ago.
The Wrack now available!
The Wrack is now available for purchase on Amazon!
It’s been a surreal ride writing it, to be sure- it’s a standalone epidemiological fantasy novel following a plague across a continent. A few months into writing it, news started coming from China of some new virus. Four days after I sent it to my editor, COVID-19 was declared a pandemic.
I really, really wish The Wrack hadn’t been so timely.
It’s a weird, depressing little book, but it’s also a hopeful one, and I’m very much proud of it- it’s some of my best writing to date. If you’re not up for reading a novel about a plague during a pandemic, I totally get it- but if you are, I hope you enjoy it.
Stay safe, everybody.
John
