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Clockwork Chaos Reviewed at SFRevu

Sam Tomaino has kindly reviewed Clockwork Chaos, edited by Neal Levin and Danielle Ackley-McPhail, over at SFRevu. It’s a nice, thorough, story-by-story review. About my tale, “Cat’s Cry in Pluto’s Kitchen,” he writes:

Morris Garvey, who made a fortune with his business, Steam Sweeps and Machinations Sundry, and Detective Daniel Matheson of the New Alexandria police force are trying to solve the crime of the theft of Brazilian virtuoso Felipe Sandeman’s violin in time for him to play it at the closing of the World Expo. The case gets stranger and stranger and involved the cult of Bast, the feline god of the Egyptians. We are led on a merry chase with lots of twists and turns in another great story in this book.

Sums it up nicely. This anthology is full of great writers so click over to the full review for his thoughts on the other stories. Or pick up a copy of the book on Amazon.

I’ve got one more Machinations Sundry story due for publication this year. I’m planning to write one more, and I suspect there’ll be another one after that. I do believe this Morris Garvey fellow, his home city of New Alexandria, and all his friends and enemies have become my new series.

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More Love for the Dragon!

Editors are like dragons.

They’re sometimes wise, often grumpy, and they covet gold in the form of good writing. They like to sleep a lot too, under mountains of manuscripts, but once you get them going, they’ll torch villages to make sure every last mixed metaphor, split infinitive, and threadbare cliche is scorched to ash. Therefore it strikes me as most appropriate that the editors of Dragon’s Lure have garnered a nomination for Best Anthology at the 2012 EPIC Awards. My story, “He Who Burns,” appears in the book, introducting Max Toth, forensic alchemist of New Alexandria. And here’s the official announcement:

Dark Quest Books and Editors Danielle Ackley-McPhail, Jennifer Ross, and Jeffrey Lyman are proud to announce that Dragon’s Lure has been selected as a finalist for the 2012 EPIC Award for Best Anthology. Dragon’s Lure is a multi-author anthology with contributions by:  John Grant, Vonnie Winslow Crist, Patrick Thomas, James Chambers, Misty Massey, Danielle Ackley-McPhail, Mike Penncavage, CE Murphy, Hildy Silverman, Bernie Mojzes, Randy Farran, CJ Henderson, Claire Stephens McMurray, Robert E. Waters, DC Wilson, Jean Marie Ward, Keith RA DeCandido, Anna Yardney, Jeffrey Lyman, James Daniel Ross, and David B. Coe.

This is not the first recognition bestowed on this collection. Recently the Washington Science Fiction Association announced the finalists for the 2011 WSFA Small Press Award,Jean Marie Ward was among those short-listed for the honor, for her short story “Lord Bai’s Discovery,” which is one of the stories in Dragon’s Lure. In addition, Vonnie Winslow Crist was among the top ten finalists in this year’s Preditors and Editors Readers’ Poll for her story Weathermaker. To learn more about the book, please visit www.sidhenadaire.com/books/DL.htm.
Congratulations go out to our contributors and all the other authors honored by the committee with finalist status in their categories.

 

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Dragon’s Lure Review

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My story, “He Who Burns,” appeared in the anthology, Dragon’s Lure.  It was one of a number of stories I’ve written where I’ve managed to surprise myself. A dragon story wasn’t on the horizon for me in any form until I was asked to contribute to this anthology. What I came up with was a definite change of pace for me, one I enjoyed writing, and one that seems to have gone over very well with readers. Most recently Dragon’s Lure garnered some kind words from the You Gotta Read Reviews blog, which said, “…each of these tales were a delight which isn’t often the case in anthologies.” My story features Max Toth, forensic alchemist in New Alexandria, a city with a salamander problem.