Tag Archives: audiobooks

Conventions, Fiction, Four Horsemen Universe, Shijuren

Rob’s Update: Spreading the Word

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Week of 13-19 August

What an eventful week so far!

First, I’ve added those who signed up at Pennsic. Many thanks for all who talked to me there, and I am already looking forward to Pennsic 47. Welcome to my weekly slice of Robness.

The biggest news is that one of the short stories I’ve been mentioning for a while was just accepted to be part of the For a Few Credits More, the second anthology in the Four Horsemen Universe.

The 4HU is one where humanity is one of hundreds of alien races living a loose arrangement whose sole goal is to ensure that the overall peace is maintained. Within that, however, are all sorts of smaller conflicts involving mercenaries, and the universe centers around these mercs fighting in a Byzantine universe of plotting and treachery.

I love it.

You can find these books here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B074KHFMQT?ref=series_rw_dp_labf

The cover is here.

FAFCM Cover
Cover for the Four Horsemen anthology For a Few Credits More.

I’ve never been more excited to be called “AND MORE” in my life.

But that’s not the only exciting thing going on here. Rob Saladino will begin recording A Lake Most Deep in audiobook form starting around 1 September. He’ll be doing my other Shijuren novels soon after, too. I don’t yet have any clue when actual release dates will be, because it takes time to do all of this well, but they are a-comin’.

In less productive news, because of my travel schedule, the move, and recovery from Pennsic, I’ve not done much other than lie in bed and contemplate bad things happening to my characters in Brief Is My Flame.

I’m just going to say that I think my characters would prefer me to sit and write than lie and plot, because I’m much nastier to them in the middle of the night snuggled in my bed with my cat sitting on my head than I am typing on my laptop. Far nastier.

Quote of the Week

This week’s quote sort of encapsulates my writing philosophy. I write about people, and whether they are wizards or use fusion-powered starships or wear powered armor, stories are about people.

“War has changed little in principle from the beginning of recorded history. The mechanized warfare of today is only an evolution of the time when men fought with clubs and stones, and its machines are as nothing without the men who invent them, man them and give them life. War is force- force to the utmost- force to make the enemy yield to our own will- to yield because they see their comrades killed and wounded- to yield because their own will to fight is broken. War is men against men. Mechanized war is still men against men, for machines are masses of inert metal without the men who control them- or destroy them.”
– Ernest J. King, as quoted in the prologue (page viii) of his memoirs, Fleet Admiral King: A Naval Record (1952).

News and Works in Progress

  • Brief Is My Flame (about 10k)

Recent Blog Posts and Wiki Additions

  • Nothing yet this week, but will have some additions to the Wiki tomorrow

Upcoming Events

Spotlight

This week’s Spotlight is on Rob Saladino , who is recording my audiobooks. His IMDB page is here: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm5238545/ and his Facebook page is here: https://www.facebook.com/thehumblereview. If you go there, you’ll see he recently recorded a biography about Prince. I suspect this is the closest I’ll ever get to Prince.

Let me know if you have any suggestions on the website, this email, or cool story ideas at rob@robhowell.org. Especially let me know of suggestions you have for the Spotlight section.

Have a great week, everyone.

Rob Howell
Author of the Shijuren-series of novels

Currently Available Works

If you think you received this email incorrectly or wish to be unsubscribed, please send an email to shijuren-owner@robhowell.org

Conventions, Fiction, Personal

News and Notes

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Greetings all

Time to clear the decks for a number of small notes.

My big news of the last week is the creation of a mailing list. If you are interested in joining it, please go to my website: www.robhowell.org and fill in the blanks in the upper left corner. Or, if you prefer, you can email me at rob@robhowell.org and I will add you manually.

I will be doing a reading at the District 2 Kansas Author’s Club at the Corinth Library, 8100 Prairie Village, Kansas from 9:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. on Saturday, September 10th. If you’re local, come on by. I’ll be reading a portion of A Lake Most Deep.

On the weekend following, I’ll be at a small con in Columbia, MO called Dodecacon. I have no clue what I’ll be doing there other than talking about writing and meeting people.

On the final weekend of September / first of October, I will be at the Kansas Author’s Club convention in Lawrence, KS. This will be a much different crowd, I suspect, than at other conventions. Very curious how this will go.

I talked to two different producers of audiobooks at WorldCon. I’ve gotten no solid numbers back nor are there any details to pass on, only that progress is getting made on that front.

I have a bunch of other irons in the fire, so many that I can’t really recall what all of them are off the top of my head. Lots of things happening, especially with regards to upcoming cons and independent bookstores.

I think that’s all for now except to mention that the above post is the sort of thing I’m including in my mailing list. I’ll be sending out an email to that list every Monday or so, detailing works in progress, upcoming events, news and notes, and a quote of the week. Again, to join the list either go to my website www.robhowell.org and fill in the two fields of the form or send me an email.

Have a great day.

Conventions, Fiction, Personal, SCA, Shijuren

Pushing Through

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One of the things I’ve been trying to do is post more often. I doubt I’ll ever get to the point where I blog every day, or even every weekday, but I understand a blog that does not post regularly becomes irrelevant.

So, even though I don’t really have a topic to focus on, I’m going push through and blog anyway. I guess my best idea is to give you a preview of what you can see on the blog in July.

I’ll have a full, detailed preview of LibertyCon coming around Wednesday the 6th. I’ll have at least one post during the con, probably on Saturday the 9th as I talk about the book release party. Then, on the 12th or so, when I get home, I’ll write a full LibertyCon AAR.

One of my goals between LibertyCon and Pennsic is to lay out a general strategy and road map for my plans for Shijuren. These plans require enough time and enough readers to pay for me to live while I write, so if you’re interested in Shijuren and want to see all the secrets revealed, let people know about my stuff. This post will happen between the 12th and the 16th.

For now, you should know I’m not thinking small.

I also plan, between LibertyCon and Pennsic, to lay out my planned schedule for as far out in the future as makes sense. I’ll have a tentative list of appearances, and reached out to them. One spoiler, since I accidentally paid twice for LibertyCon this year, I’m already paid for LibertyCon 30 in 2017. You can expect a full post about this in the week between the 23rd and 30th.

I’ll also be looking at Patreon and Kickstarter stuff. Money is, not surprisingly, an issue for me, and I’ll be figuring out ways to use these two sources. One Kickstarter that will likely happen is one to pay for the creation of A Lake Most Deep on audiobook.

As a side note, my plan is to release everything in audiobook format eventually, but I need to figure out the process, which I will do as I’m doing the first one. In any case, I hope to have a full plan for that written and published in July.

For not having anything to really say, I sure said a lot. I have to say that this post may be a model for future posts, where I write a blog entry about what’s on tap for the next month. It will serve me as a checklist and provide a preview for you.

Thanks for letting me babble. I’m going to relax for a few days with friends and recharge at Trillium War. I’m sure I will see some of you there. For the rest, I’ll chat with you next week.