I woke up this morning to a winter wonderland. The trees and rooftops of my neighborhood look like they are covered in icing. Yards and parks look like rolling dunes of powdered sugar. The streets are largely clear from traffic, but a passing bus wears a toupee of snow. All in all, it puts me in a nice mind for Christmas, sledding, and festive family fun.

But it’s nearly Easter.

I really hope the Easter Bunny can double as a sleigh dog this weekend.

The Failed Technomancer

Do you like science fantasy? Do you like big books? Do you like riffs on the zombie genre? Do you like sci-fi wizards? Go buy The Failed Technomancer, temporarily at the steal of a price $0.99. This week I have even more links to share with you, so you can go purchase it wherever you prefer!

The following links are universal links, which means it shouldn’t matter which country you are in, you will be directed to the correct storefront to purchase The Failed Technomancer.

• Books2Read General—The below stores are all accessible through this link, but accessing those stores through this link takes two clicks, whereas just using the below links will get you where you want to go in one click. That said, if your preferred ebook vendor is Scribd, SmashWords, Angus & Robertson, or Mondadori, this is the link for you. (As Draft2Digital publishes The Failed Technomancer to more online vendors, the number of vendors available through this link will increase.)

• Amazon—Direct link to the Amazon purchase page.

• Apple Books—Direct link to the Apple Books purchase page.

• Barnes & Noble—Direct link to the Barnes & Noble purchase page.

• Google Play—Direct link to the Google Play purchase page.

• Kobo—Direct link to the Kobo purchase page.

The physical versions of the book continue to be delayed by little things that hopefully will be fixed with greater experience. For example, Amazon couldn’t accept the cover for The Failed Technomancer because it was about 0.01 inches too small (in height), and B&N felt similarly but quoted 0.02 inches. So when I say little things, I mean really little things.

Also, shout out to my artist, Hannah King—she’s graduating college this week! Huge milestone. I feel mildly guilty to keep coming back to her with requests for fixes when she already has quite a bit on her plate.

As for the audiobook, I received the audio files last week, and I think they turned out pretty OK. My audio guy had a list of a few spots that he recommended I re-record, so I followed his advice and sent those files back to him. Thus, we’re back to the waiting game.

Inner Demon

This book is a lot of fun.

Emotional struggle can create some really entertaining fiction, particularly when the protagonist is absolutely torn between two good things.

My goal is to finish most developmental edits for this book in April, and I’ve completed the prologue and the first three chapters so far. I’ll keep providing updates each week, but let me tell you, this book is going to be fire. It also kicks off the Third Realm universe, for which I already have two other books in the works, Grand Odyssey (working title) and The Ballad of Carthage Jones (working title).

“Bloggyness”

I finished two books this week, both of which were extremely delightful for very different reasons.

The first—as should be easily predicted, since I’ve been making my way through the published Stranger Times books—is This Charming Man, the sequel to Stranger Times. Hannah, Banecroft, and the others have more-or-less accepted that the world they once knew is significantly more magical than they ever could have imagined, and now that they are fully “in the knew” the “powers that be” can hire them to do some investigative work. There have been a slew of vampire attacks in the city—and vampires are not supposed to exist.

Compared to The Stranger Times—a really good book on its own—This Charming Man has one(ish) big weakness and quite a few big strengths. Personally, I found the overall plot of This Charming Man to be more rambley and less engaging than The Stranger Times. As a related issue, I didn’t find the character Sturgess to be as well utilized, but I’m not sure if that was avoidable given that he forgot all of the events of the first book.

But those are my only criticisms—I thought The Stranger Times a hilarious book, and This Charming Man was even funnier. In particular, two characters stole the show for me: Coggs, a man who was cursed by a river goddess so that he can never lie, walk on land, or swim in water (so he is just stuck on a boat forever); and Zeke, a dog that used to be human and has a very dry sense of humor. Both characters played off of each other with amazing comedic timing, showing up just enough to always be engaging but not so much to take over the book. *chef’s kiss* In fact, the ensemble cast overall was extremely well-utilized, so my hat’s off to CK McDonnell.

Also, I appreciated Vincent Banecroft’s alternative swearing system, for as long as it lasted. One-ing Two! (Did I do that right? Regardless, it led to a variety of gut-busting moments.)

The second book I finished was Tress of the Emerald Sea. I really liked this book. Sanderson set out to write a modern fairy tale for adults, and on so many levels he delivers. Tress, as a person, is an engaging and genuinely good protagonist, who has an excellently interesting journey from humble window washer to—well, I won’t spoil where she ends up, but let’s say she grows and develops about as much as a character can in this book. The world is wildly inventive and extremely well-incorporated into the story, and the characters are colorful and fleshed-out. I read this book to my wife from the faux-leather hardcovers that Sanderson published through his “Secret Books” Kickstarter, and I was frequently blown away by the gorgeous art in this book, and the overall incredible quality of the book itself. This is my first foray into premium books, and if Sanderson continues to create this caliber of art in the book itself, on top of the top-notch writing, I might see my bank account dangerously diminish as I begin to collect his other premium faux-leather hardcovers. I hope more authors start doing this sort of thing.

If I must add a criticism, it’s simply that I finished the book wanting more. Most of the book takes its time with the scenes and with development, ebbing and flowing in character success and failure, and I wish that the climax of the book could have been drawn out a little longer. Ultimately, I can’t really complain about the climax because it was still satisfying, but if there’s ever a future ultra-premium edition that gives me a few new chapters to flesh out the sorceress a bit more I’d be intrigued.

Also—spoiler alert—this book was very inspired by The Princess Bride (a true classic, both the book and the movie), as Sanderson discusses in his afterword. As a tongue-in-cheek criticism for Tress, this book wasn’t nearly cynical enough for something inspired by William Goldman’s magnum opus. (Tress of the Emerald Sea is an exceptionally hopeful and uplifting book.)

As a final forewarning, Tress makes a significant number of references to the greater cosmere—later in the book in particular—that are ridiculous amounts of fun to catch if you’ve read most of the body of cosmere novels. Understanding these references is in no way a requirement for enjoying the book, though.

In Conclusion…

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