T minus 9 days and counting

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M Day is coming. We are now in the single digits for the paperback release of Monster Hunter International. Review copies have been sent to various magazines and review webpages.

The e-book is out at Baen’s Webscriptions, and I’ve been getting bunches of e-mails from people who’ve now read the book, and it has been extremely humbling. When you put a lot of effort into something, and a reader comes back and tells you how it brightened their day, or they couldn’t put it down, or that it just captured their imagination, then you are on top of the world. You guys like it, I’ve managed to entertain you, and that, my friends, is an absolutely wonderful feeling.

And so is getting paid!  Book is doing well on Amazon. Still dominating in the Christian Romance (snort!) section on Tower (but they’ve got Jim Butcher in there for some reason too, so whatever), and I’m now as high as I’ve ever been on B&N. For the longest time, if you just put Correia into the search engine on Amazon I came up first (take that Correia Art Glass, which is really pretty by the way, and we’re probably cousins, so maybe you could hook me up for something nice for my wife’s birthday… just saying),but I was always further down the list on B&N and Tower, behind various cookbooks by Correias, and movies with Correias in them, but now I’m first.

I figure it is kind of like the Highlander, and various Correias will square off until there can be only one, but I’ve still got some pro baseball players and hockey players to go, and those guys are in better shape, so I shouldn’t talk too much smack. Man, I’m just glad my last name isn’t Jones or Brown.

I need a Japanese speaker

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Is there anyone out there who is fluent in Japanese who would be willing to help me out with something that I’m writing right now? I need a few phrases, and I would like them to be better than the crap the internet translators put out.

And don’t mess with me and give me a bad translation and have the character say something like , “Chicken fish bathroom subway tentacle porn!” or “The man writing this is bald and fat and smells of strange cheeses.”  I will have it verified… By actual ninjas. Who I will then dispatch to your house…. I know people.

Anyway, shoot me an e-mail at monsterhunter45 AT hotmail DOT com if you are fluent in Japanese and you’d be willing to help write a few lines of The Grimnoir Chronicles.

EDIT:  I think we’ve got it.

Omaetachi wa kotei o shitsubou saseta. Watashi no meiyo wa hijyou ni kizu
tsuite. Watashi ga dekiru koto wa, mohaya jiketsu shika nai.

General update on stuff:

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We’re up to 27 entries so far in the Great MHI Patch-Off.  I’m leaving it open until the end of August, because frankly, most folks haven’t read the book yet. I’m amazed by how good the entries are so far and also how many there have been. These are awesome guys.

In writing news, I’m at 124,000 words in The Grimnoir Chronicles: Hard Magic.  I’m in the final action sequence, but it is an epic event, from four POVs, with lots of stuff going down, so I’m not sure how long it will be exactly, but at the rate I’m going, I feel like I should have the 1st draft of TGC:HM done in the next few weeks.

I still need to come up with about another dozen fake historical quotes from people from the 1850s-1930s. I enjoy making those up, but right now I’m just writing, which is different than tweaking quotes, so I’ve got to go in the direction the muse takes me.

I’m eager to get the 1st pass done, so that I can let it sit and percolate. Usually what I like to do when I finish a book is to let is sit for awhile while I work on something else. That way when I go back and read it again, I’ve got fresh eyes, plus my cadre of the elite Reader Force Alpha will have had a chance to pick through it and tell me where I was stupid, forgetful, lame, boring, illiterate, had my head shoved up my butt, was smoking crack, hadn’t gotten enough sleep, forgot how to spell, or other such things. They’re the best of the best, and they like to hurt my feelings.

Meanwhile, another bit of my custom 5.56 Race AK project is done. Super Machinist Mike Bond has finished my aluminum forearm, so I get to pick it up soon. I will post pictures. Now all I need is the trigger group, stock, pistol grip, muzzle attachement, optics, and finish, and I’ll be done. Plus, I think I’m going to go order one of those Magnolia adapters so it can take AR mags. This should be a fun one.