Announcement: A Glamour of Toads is out

It's been a long time indeed since I updated this blog ... life has been like that. As the saying goes, "One damn" thing after another.' 

Anyone remember the Farside-style cartoon of two monsters chasing each other down a street while a couple of middle-aged ladies look on, and one lady says to the other (!), "It's just one goddamn thing after another." Mmm. That's been life in a nutshell. Don't ask. 

But I'm back at last -- with less news that I'd hoped to be able to relay, but at least there's something. 

It begins with an update on A Glamour of Toads, which was published in Dragon Gems, Summer 2023 issue ... available as of last month, I believe. As the cover indicates, this is a kind of cute and/or "cracked" fairy-tale fantasy anthology, and I'm sure Glamour fits perfectly...

The story of a young woman who's blessed, or cursed, with enormous courage and physical ugliness (no other way to parse this, so -- grasp it, and weaponize it), and she finds herself born into the era of the witch hunts, what we call the 'burning times.' 

Worse yet, her village lies directly in the path of an oncoming Witchfinder who's notorious for his treatment of people just like her. She's not a witch, but she's going to be treated as one ... so, what's to be done about it? Sarah has recently lost her dad, who was a woodsman by trade. His work often took them into the forest, which is how Sarah knows of a certain cottage, way back in the wildwood: the house where three women live. Women who are so skilled in the Craft of the Wise, the world is oblivious to them. They have no fear of the Witchfinder and his troops, and once upon a moonless midnight, Sarah knocks at their door and begs for a boon. For magic. 

The only potential fly in the ointment is that to read Glamour, you'll need a subscription to something called SCRIBD.  Now, in and of itself, SRIBD is a marvellous idea. In a nutshell, here is their advertising line: "Enjoy millions of ebooks, audiobooks, magazines, and more, with a free trial." 

You could read Dragon Gems Summer 2023 on the 30-day free trial, course ... but if I had a tablet, and I didn't mind a monthly fee of about AUD$20, I think I'd be subscribing. I'll be brutally honest at this moment: I have things to save for, so my own discretional spending is shackled and bound. But when I've bought the camera and lenses I want (price tag, around two grand -- you get the picture), SRCIBD will be on my list, along with a YouTube subscription (to get rid of those pesky commercials). 

So -- Find A Glamour of Toads right here, but be prepared to take them up on the offer of that free trial. You should be able to read on phones ... I certainly could!

I wish there were more to update, but the publishers for whom a whole raft of stories and poems were written have been delayed, and only recently opened back up for reading. Everything is late, so the news is a bit thin on the publishing front. 

However, there's more, if the hard, demanding and exacting work of the editor counts in this publishing game -- and it does. I spent some fascinating weeks working on A Tradition of Evil, a Sherlock Holmes novel by Mike Adamson. The job was actually a lot of fun, and the book (which went on sale, from Belanger Books, just a couple of months ago) is a great read that's being very well rated at Amazon. It was also my great pleasure to build Mike's new author website, not least because it gave me the opportunity to flex my illustrator's muscles, and provide all the original artwork...

And when I'd finished construction on that website, I was so envious -- I decided to build one for myself,  for my art and photography. I'm halfway through at this moment. And that is how time flew away, even before you add in some bad luck, car troubles, winter, flu, and the usual domestic drivel. Something had to go on the backburner, and the blogs were the unfortunate choice. I've barely kept touch with Facebook in the same span of time! 

Hopefully, this can turn around now.