Here’s the cover for the Vitruvian Mask. What do you think?
Cover Reveal time!
Chattering
It’s ready! The Vitruvian Mask is DONE
The Vitruvian Mask, the full sequel to the Archimedean Heart is FINALLY done. As in ready to publish. <shocked face>
With many thanks to my extremely talented editor AJ Sikes and my kind and inspirational readers, Dover Whitecliff and Sharon Cathcart.
Here’s what it’s about:
The electric lights of Paris have been extinguished.
1882. The Naturalist revolution is over. Adelaide, once Doctor-Scientist for the old queen of France, was on the losing side. Now she’s hiding from the new king’s Police Sécrète.
Pregnant and alone, she seeks refuge in a Parisian hospital but things have changed there too. What was once a cathedral of Science is now a bastion of ignorance and superstition.
The battlefield veterans whose Augmented prosthetics she once created are now shunned by the new regime and come to the hospital for her help. But her nemesis and the father of her child has returned to France and threatens to reveal her to the authorities.
Can Adelaide repair her Augmented patients without losing her freedom … or her life?
The Vitruvian Mask continues the story of Adelaide Coumain, the Roboticist of Versailles, that began in The Archimedean Heart.
Coming soon: the cover reveal. Then a special giveaway for my subscribers.
A new page appears!
The Vitruvian Mask, the next episode in the saga of the Roboticist of Versailles, will be published next year (WOOHOO!) so I thought it time to collect all of the those stories in one page on the blog. Everything from the early origin stories of Adelaide Coumain, the Roboticist of Versailles, to her most recent adventures can be accessed from that page. And there will soon be bonus content. Yes, free stories!
Been such a long time…
Pandemic time is weird. Hoping the pandemic is waning and life can be, I dunno, normal-ish?
So what have you been up to?
I wish I could say I had spent the lockdown producing like mad but nope. I survived. I didn’t get sick. But I didn’t finish a book nor did I start one. But I am crawling out of my creative void and editing the Vitruvian Mask! Stay tuned.
Dear White People, This is What We Want You to Do
As a White woman, it’s been horrifying to confront all of the violence towards Black people in the U.S. Silently watching is no longer an option for those of good conscience. But how to do it right, without causing even more harm to People of Color and without being some kind of White Saviour?
This article helped sort out some of that for me. If you’re interested in helping but are unsure how, read the article.
via Dear White People, This is What We Want You to Do
#blacklivesmatter
First draft of The Vitruvian Mask complete!
I spent the last five months drafting the sequel to The Archimedean Heart
and it’s finally done! Woot! Adelaide’s arc is complete!
It took me a long time to finish the last few scenes for some reason. Just couldn’t get into writing.
Finishing a first draft is always such a relief. Although I did a lot of planning and pre-writing, I have some revising to do, but not right now. Now I will sit back and breathe.
Hoping to publish this one in Spring 2021, but we’ll see. Post-production always takes me longer than expected.
Whatever happened to…
A harrowing look at the effect of domestic violence on a woman writer’s career:
Longreads “Whatever happened to…”
Envy over her success led her husband, also a writer, to become violent. She fights every day for her safety — and to avoid being relegated to obscurity like so many writers who are mothers.
The author had to publish this anonymously because of fear of her abuser.
No Sales or Lackluster Sales: It Isn’t the Reader, It’s the Book…Really — Kristen Lamb
Why isn’t your book selling?
Kristen Lamb, self-described Professional Troublemaker, lays it on the line for authors, indie and traditional.
Original image courtesy of Juhan Sonin via Flickr Creative commons. No sales or lackluster sales. It isn’t the reader’s fault. It’s the book. Really. This is tough to hear. I know. It’s a writer’s worst nightmare. You researched, you wrote, you finished, and then published your book. You wait for the sales and…. *crickets* This…
via No Sales or Lackluster Sales: It Isn’t the Reader, It’s the Book…Really — Kristen Lamb
Whitby Weekend: Tail of the unexpected…
Mr Fox is a dance troupe out of Yorkshire. An old tradition based on translations from a mysterious book.
Listen for the drums.
Look for the fire.Sue Vincent describes a recent Mr Fox event and shares her photos.
It was dark, but not late, as we drove at a leisurely pace back into Whitby, expecting the streets to be as quiet as the previous night. As we approached the bridge, though, a drumbeat began… and at, the same moment, I saw the distinctive shape of a well-known banner, black against the harbour lights. In unison, Stuart and I…like children seeing Santa Claus… cried, “FOXES!” And suddenly, it was all about finding somewhere…anywhere… to park.
We’d had no idea they were going to be in Whitby that weekend! What were the chances? With one thing and another, we had not been able to see them dance this year and we were both missing that.
Gary, of course, hadn’t a clue what was happening… and to be fair, neither Stuart nor I were a lot of help, at least not in any coherent sense. Just saying ‘its Mister…
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Fiction: The end of Lower Broome
Shel Calopa just released her debut novel, Letters to the Light, dystopian, set 1,000 years in the future in Australia. Exciting stuff. Great prose and story world. I can’t wait to read the whole thing!
AGGY WILCOCKS SURFACED, gasping and coughing. The surging flood had taken her by surprise, separating her from her family, pushing her right through town and slamming her against the tin veranda of the transit station.
Winded, she sucked desperately for air before diving down into the murky water in a frantic search for Uncle or the children. She came back up, still breathless and alone. Aggy dove again, pushing at the shifting debris. Lots of branches, a tractor battery, two dolls and some hydroponic drip-feeding tubes. Nothing important or useful.
Bobbing atop the water-line and blinking back tears, she squinted towards the horizon. The familiar landmarks were missing. No more grain silo or McWilliam’s two-storey Pub. Even the town hall, where she had hoped to attend her first harvest dance with Stevie Bennet, had gone. Swirling, turgid water had swallowed everything and everyone; so quickly.
Aggy grabbed a wooden table…
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BJ Sikes, author 