Okay, a bunch of new stuff is now public so I can talk about it.

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First, many of you have heard that bestselling author John Ringo loved my Monster Hunter International series so much that he was inspired to write a book set in that universe (without telling me!). You’ve got to understand, John is one of those authors with the muse thing, where he won’t write for months, and then all of a sudden he’ll get in this mood, and write like 50,000 words a week, no sleep, living off of caffeine. The dude is a machine. Baen fans joke about the Ringo Book of the Month Club, but they aren’t kidding. That’s how John rolls. He gets spun up, and he’s brilliant at it.

(me personally, I’m a plodder. I average 10k a week, working normal job hours, but that’s every week, and I’m consistent).

By the time I got to see this book, John had already written the second one of the trilogy.

Now, pro-tip, even if you are taken by surprise, when one of the most successful authors around says that he wants to write books set in one of your universes, and he already has, you make that work. 🙂

I went through the first book last week. I loved it. Freaking awesome. He’s been posting tons of snippets on Facebook. Fans are loving it too.

But as John discovered, I’m an accountant at heart, or as he said, I’m somewhere on the OCD scale. And I’ve got 5 big books, more planned, and an RPG worth of continuity to make sure everything matches. John made a tradition of killing Joe Buckley in all his novels because Buckley once sent back one of his manuscripts with like a hundred comments. He said he doesn’t know what to do with me since I sent back twice that, and some of them were a page long. (but to be fair, before John violently red shirts me in some other series, many of those comments were things like “LoL” or “awesome scene” and the long ones were about the detailed secret history of monster hunting, or me putting my firearms expert hat on, because the story itself was cool as hell).

So anyways, long story short. These books are now collaborations. I don’t know if Toni has approved the titles yet. And I don’t know the release dates. But probably next year there will be the beginning of a new MHI trilogy, set in the 1980s. They are the memoirs of a Hunter from a period of time before the regular MH series started.

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There is also going to be an anthology of short stories set in the Monster Hunter International Universe from various authors.

From editor Bryan Thomas Schmidt: I am very pleased to announce that Larry Correia and I have signed a contract as co-editors with Baen for an anthology with the working title MONSTER HUNTER TALES which will feature stories set in the universe of his NYT Bestselling MONSTER HUNTER INTERNATIONAL series. Besides Larry, authors will include Jim Butcher, Jonathan Maberry, Jessica Day George, Faith Hunter, John Ringo, Sarah A. Hoyt, John A. Pitts, Jody Lynn Nye, Mike Kupari, Maurice Broaddus and more. For release in 2017.

And he is right on the And More, because we’ve got a bunch of awesome authors lined up for this project. I think we’ve got 6 or 7 NYT bestsellers in there, which is pretty impressive for an anthology.

We’ve also got a bunch of talented up and comers and new authors too. Bryan didn’t list all the names, so I don’t know who is confirmed and who has signed contracts, so that’s all I’ll say.

I’m really excited for this one.

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I’ve got a couple other really exciting MHI related projects in development, but I can’t say anything further about those yet.

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Then there was this press release from Baen last week:

Baen Books Announces Eleven New Science Fiction and Fantasy Acquisitions

Works include Lois McMaster Bujold Vorkosigan Saga Novel, and Original Novels from Best Selling Authors Larry Correia, Michael Z. Williamson, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, Catherine Asaro, Brad Torgersen, and Charles E. Gannon

Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, a new Vorkosigan Saga novel by award winningNew York Times best-selling science fiction author Lois McMaster Bujold, is among eleven recent acquisitions by Baen Books. The new Vorkosigan novel was agented by Eleanor Wood of the Spectrum Literary Agency.

Baen has also purchased two new entries in the best-selling Liaden Universe® science fiction series by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, agented by Jennifer Jackson of the Donald Maass Literary Agency.

Three new books from Hugo finalist Michael Z. Williamson—two of which will be set in the universe of his time travel novel A Long Time Until Now  (May 2015)—and one set in the world of Williamson’s long running and popular Ripple Creek series are on the slate.

A new novel by Hugo finalist, Audie Award Winner, and New York Times best-selling author, Larry Correia, titled Wendell, will be delivered by the creator of the New York Times best-selling Monster Hunter International contemporary fantasy series.

Baen has also acquired two new novels in the Caine Riordan science fiction series from Nebula finalist and Compton Crook award winner Charles E. Gannon.

Further acquisitions include a new hard science fiction novel by AnLab award winner and multiple Hugo finalist Brad Torgersen, and a new Skolian universe science fiction mystery novel from two-time Nebula award winner Catherine Asaro, via agent Eleanor Wood.

“We are extremely pleased with this wonderful selection of new novels we will soon offer eager fans,” said Baen Books publisher Toni Weisskopf. “And we’re very happy to work with a group of such fine writers whose work engages and entertains hundreds of thousands of readers.”

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I have no comment on what top secret project Wendell is. 🙂

I believe that with these latest deals I’m now back up to 14 or 15 books under contract.

Right now I’m working on the third and final Dead Six novel with Mike Kupari. Up next, two other Monster Hunter novels that take place at the same time (details to come). And the next novels after Son of the Black Sword (by the way, I’ve been getting really positive buzz on the eARC, which you can get here http://www.baenebooks.com/p-2688-son-of-the-black-sword-earc.aspx ) House of Assassins and Destroyer of Worlds.

So back to the plod!

Mark your calenders. Our next Book Bomb is going to be next Tuesday, April 28th, for Steve Diamond’s debut novel, Residue.

For those of you not familiar with Book Bombs, that’s where we try to get as many people as possible to buy the same book on Amazon on the same day, in order to push it as high as possible in the sales rankings. The higher we get it, the more other people notice it. Success leads to success, and a good Book Bomb will get an author a whole bunch of new fans, and most importantly the author GETS PAID.

I was one of the alpha readers on this one. It is a great book, and Steve is a fantastic writer. It is an action/horror story, monsters, psychic powers, and I was his gun consultant. It is marketed as Young Adult, but that just means he has a teenage protagonist and doesn’t get to swear much or sex it up. 🙂

 

This post is an experiment to see if I can post pictures directly from my iPhone into the new WordPress page. No idea if this will work or not. 🙂

I paint minis to relax my brain. I usually put a cop show or audiobook streaming in the background, and do this for an hour or two at night. It really helps me refocus the next day.
These are some Infinity minis I’ve done over the last couple months. (Spanish company, fantastic sculpts) I’ve done a bunch more, but need to get some good lights set up and take some decent photos. These are just crappy iPhone pictures in bad light.

Once I get some good lighting set up, I’ll take better shots. I’m not the best painter, but I’m pretty darned fast. I’ve only played a few games of Infinity (Warmachine is still my game) but I’ve painted about sixty of their minis since the beginning of Winter. (I went ahead and bought about half their product line off of Black Friday sales from Miniatures Market and FRP Games, because there is nothing more dangerous than a nerd with disposable income)

The terrain is MDF pieces glued together by my me and my son, and then I gave them a quick, basic paint job with an air brush. That is about 1/3 of the stuff for the sci-fi themed wargaming table I’m working on right now.  The next Writer Nerd Game Night campaign I’m running is going to be sci-fi Savage Worlds, and I like to bring a ridiculous amount of props.

The lovely Mrs. Correia requested that I avoid the internet as much as possible this weekend, so I’ve got a ton of comments and messages to go through. So bullet points!

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Somebody make sure this bit gets back to GRRM. He wanted to know if he could have input on SP4 nominees. Not my call, talk to Kate. She’s in charge next year and I don’t know what she’s going to do. However, I’m guessing that since Brad just took suggestions on his blog for things that were worthy, quality works that would normally not have a chance of getting nominated, from authors who were normally ignored, and your suggestions fit that, then sure. Suggest away.

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The replacements were announced for the authors who dropped out. I’ve not read Three Body Problem yet but I’ve heard good things about it. A Single Samurai is a great story. Because I am apparently required to state the obvious, I encourage everyone to read all of the works and vote for what they think is the best.

Amusing side note, I was told Vox Day loved Three Body Problem, and the only reason it wasn’t on his RP was that he hadn’t read it in time… So quick, nobody tell the angry guilt by association mob. 🙂

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During all this controversy, I’ve had detractors attack me for things people say in my blog comments. I replied that I don’t mess with the comments. I don’t “massage”, “kitten”, or “disemvowel”. I don’t remove posts just because I disagree with them. I let people argue freely. And in all the years of doing this I’ve only blocked a handful of trolls and crazy people.

Apparently the trolls and crazy people took that as a challenge, and I got a bunch of “I’m a huge Corriea fan (some of them couldn’t even spell my name right) and SP supporter (who has never posted here before) and racial slur, racial slur, racial slur, threats against authors we disagree with, racial slur, racial slur! (seriously, it was like they were trying to channel Boyd Crowder). Yay Sad Puppies.”

I’m sure they thought this was a clever trap, either Correia approves these posts showing his supporters are huge flaming nutterbutters, or he’s a hypocrite who does moderate comments. But that thing about normally not blocking people? Yeah, that’s my personal attempt at allowing free speech, not a suicide pact. Blocked, dumb asses.  Sheesh. This isn’t rocket science.

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Apparently there were a bunch more stupid articles and news reports this weekend, still running with the angry straight white men, anti-diversity slate angle. I don’t even bother reading them anymore. It is all the same script. I didn’t even know Popular Science was still around.

In the interest of full disclosure, none of the hit pieces tried to talk to us, but NPR’s On The Media did try to reach out. They sent me an email, they wanted to speak on the phone to gather info, but it was on a day when I was running around the wilds of Yard Moose Mountain and I missed their call. I sent them an apology the next morning.

I haven’t listened, but I heard they brought in professional outrage monger Arthur Chu to explain everything. Ha! But to be fair, they at least tried.

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Now this week, I can either keep repeating myself, or I can get back to work. Despite the best attempts to destroy my reputation a bunch of people still want to give me large sums of money for writing stuff, so work it is.