Here is a treat for you guys.
Part 1 http://www.baen.com/rock_meet_hard_place
Part 2 http://www.baen.com/rock_meet_hard_place2
This story takes place between the finale of Swords of Exodus and the beginning of Alliance of Shadows (which will be out next month).
This story features the talents of an awesome up and coming author, Peter Nealen. And is a pretty nifty expansion of the D6 universe.
https://americanpraetorians.wordpress.com
You guys should check out the rest of Peter’s work. If you like Dead Six it’ll be right up your alley.
I’ve read Nealen’s “American Praetorians” novels, and just finished his “Kill Yuan” last week. They are good.
Excellent! Thanks guys!
I’ve had several of Nealen’s books on my Amazon wishlist for a while – but haven’t read any yet, but this looks like a good excuse to check him out.
This project was a blast to work on. Thanks to both Larry and Mike for letting me play in their sandbox, and of course Mike for recruiting me for it in the first place.
I’m really curious how this story came about. Can you give us some BTS info? It’s cool that you’re opening up some of your worlds to other authors, and I’m always curious to see how such stories get released into the wild (since published stories set in worlds not created by their author, short of media tie-in fiction, are so rare).
In this case, Toni likes to get short stories set in a universe before a new book in that universe comes out, to put for free on the Baen page. However, the way we ended Swords and started Alliance of Shadows, my character of Lorenzo wasn’t somewhere he could tell a story. However, Valentine was still bouncing around the world having adventures, so he could have did a solo story, but then Mike had the idea of inviting Peter to join in, that way it could stay in the D6 conflicting/competing narrator style.
We both know Peter, know he’s got skills, and he’s a very good writer. So Mike invited him to do this one, so it is Dragic vs. Valentine. It’s a good bonus for Peter too, because D6 fans can read this, and see that he’s good, and then go check out his books.
Cool! (I really would love to see this kind of thing catch on more. It’s a great way to let readers try out new authors and for authors to try to gain new readers.)
You know, if you guys keep treating this like a business and trying to make money, you’re going to end up committing career suicide… Again. For the 5th time.
Career suicide sure seems profitable.
There is a lot of room for expansions novels. The geopolitical state is very different from what we have today and both characters have had adventures all over the world before the first novel started so there are a lot of stories there.
The other part of the Dead Six universe I’d like to explore as a reader is the fantasy element. We’ve only had glimpses but the supernatural is very real. The Exodus series of books would fit the bill here.
Mr. Nealen also has a series of Witch Hunter novels which I enjoyed very much. From the title and the framing story you might think they are ripping off MHI, but they’re not: they have a totally different slant and feel.
I would be remiss, though, not to say that without MHI, the Jed Horn stories might not have happened. Definitely some inspiration, there.
That was awesome! I wasn’t clear on whether this would be in the short story collections or something like an extended cut or purely a side-bit for fans?
Extended cut, bonus feature.