Category Archives: legends

legends

The Heavenly Fox – Discarnate Edition

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Heavenly Fox - eBook1Okay, one more and I promise I’m done, at least for a little bit. To our left is a picture of the ebook edition of The Heavenly Fox, my PS Publishing novella that was a finalist for the Mythopoeic Award in 2012. The unsigned edition is still available from PS, though the signed edition has long since sold out. Regardless, for anyone who’d like a reading copy but don’t want to lay out limited edition hardcover prices, this is the way to go. The Kindle edition is already up. I should have the Nook/Kobo version ready in a few days.

Here’s the synopsis from the hc edition:

“A fox who reaches the age of fifty gains the ability to transform into a human woman. A fox who reaches the age of one hundred can transform into either a beautiful young girl or a handsome young man at will and can sense the world around them to a distance of over four hundred leagues. A fox who reaches the age of one thousand years, however, becomes a Heavenly Fox, an Immortal of great power, able to commune with the gods themselves.”

—From the Hsuan-Chang-Chi of Kuo P’u

The fox vixen Springshadow has reached the age of nine-hundred and ninety-nine by taking the form of a beautiful girl and stealing the chi, the life force, of mortal men. She prides herself on having done so without permanently harming any of them, but when, just before her one-thousandth birthday, her mortal lover, Zou Xiaofan, inadvertently forces her to choose between his life or her immortality, she chooses immortality without a moment’s hesitation. As a fox, and thus completely devoid of a conscience, for Springshadow this was no choice at all.

Or so she thought. Springshadow soon discovers what a trap immortality can be. Even more serious—and very annoying—is her discovery that her new state of being includes a new emotion, one that feels very much like regret. She knows from there it is only one small step to developing an actual conscience. Intolerable! Yet what can she do to prevent this? When the Goddess of Mercy, Guan Shi Yin, brings her a message from the shade of her former lover, Springshadow believes she’s found her answer. Accompanied by a reprobate Daoist immortal named Wildeye, the Heavenly Fox undertakes a quest through the courts of Heaven and the terrors of Hell to redeem the soul of Zou Xiaofan. Maybe then she can get on with the rest of eternity without regret. Or that pesky conscience thing.

All the Gates of Hell – Incarnate Edition

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ATGOH-Proof CopyTo our left is a picture of the printed proof copy of All the Gates of Hell that arrived on my doorstep day before yesterday. The picture isn’t that great (cameraphone), but the book itself turned out pretty good, in my own opinion. So for anyone not yet ready to embrace the ebook revolution, there is now an actual, real book that you can hold in your hands and, you know, read. You can order from Amazon at the link above or directly from your favorite bookseller.

ISBN-10: 1492993263
ISBN-13: 978-1492993261
300 pages, $11.99

“Legal Assistant Jin Lee Hannigan thought she had problems enough as a single woman in rundown Medias, Mississippi. That was before Jin meets a homeless man on Pepper Street who just happens to be the King of Hell, and learns that she’s really the mortal incarnation of Guan Shi Yin, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy, charged with the rescue of unfortunates trapped in the various — and nasty — hells scattered around the cosmos. That doesn’t even turn out to be her biggest problem. It seems that the Goddess of Mercy is on the run and in hiding, which is why she incarnated as a human in the first place. Hiding from what?
Love.
But why would anyone fear love? Jin already knows that love is powerful, but what she has to learn, and fast, is that the wrong kind of love is also potentially the most destructive force in all the universe and–even more important–how to stop it.”

Off to See the Lama

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MothI’ve been scarce this week because First Reader and I took a trip to Atlanta to hear the Dalai Lama give a talk at Emory University. He was there because there is a co-operative initiative between his monastery and the school in, of all things, the science department. Tibetan monks are being trained as science teachers at the university so they can go back to the monastery and teach classes in modern science within the Tibetan curriculum (said monastic program takes a mere twenty years to complete. And I thought Grad Students had it rough).

I don’t have a lot to say about the talk. You sort of had to be there. But I will note two things.  1) The Dalai Lama is an incredibly smart guy. You only had to hear him question one of the scientists present on a fine point of experimental methodology to pick up on that.  2) It was nice to hear someone who ought to know holding the opinion that a) religion isn’t enough for a full understanding of the universe and b) science and spirituality are not and should not be in conflict. Which has always been my own opinion on the subject.

Beneath Ceaseless Skies #131, Fifth Anniversary

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Yoshino-1Partly for selfish reasons, but also because sometimes people get annoyed when they aren’t told these things, I’m proud to announce that my own “Cherry Blossoms on the River of Souls” is the lead story in Issue #131, the Fifth Anniversary Double Issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies. The remainder of the issue’s contents, featuring stories by Adam Callaway, Alberto Yáñez, Rebecca Gomez Farrell, and Naim Kabir, plus a special audio fiction broadcast, will go live on October 10th.

“Cherry Blossoms on the River of Souls” you can read now. If you want.

Muse and Writer Dialogue #9

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LucilleMUSE and WRITER Dialogues #9

 
 
FADE IN
 

 A room that passes for an office. There are bookshelves on one wall, a motley assortment of carvings, signed storyboards, and framed magazine covers on the free wall space. On the far wall is a medieval-style heraldic wall display of a cockatrice and a banner in bad Latin “Pullus non Est.”  Horizontal files sit beneath the window.  The computer desk is on the wall nearest the door, facing away from the window. Beside that is a printer on a stand. In the base of that is a PC and a PS3. On the right wall hang three guitars. There would be four, except WRITER, currently sitting at the desk, is strumming one of them.

Enter the MUSE. She looks like a Greek goddess, except when she doesn’t. Right now she tends to morph between goddess and rocker chick.

WRITER: Can’t you make up your mind?

MUSE:  You’re one to talk. And why are you torturing that poor guitar?

WRITER (Holds up guitar in question): Beauty, isn’t it? A Michael Kelly Deuce
            Phoenix, semi-hollowbody. They don’t make them anymore.

MUSE: I didn’t ask what it was, I asked why you were torturing it. Are you channeling Dick Cheney?

WRITER: Don’t be silly, and I’m not “torturing it.” I’m practicing a 12-bar blues shuffle.

MUSE: Same thing, from where I stand. Didn’t George Carlin once say that white people got no business playing the blues, ever?

WRITER: If BB King, Albert King, Buddy Guy, Hubert Sumlin, “Sonnyboy” Edwards,  etc. didn’t have a problem with Stevie Ray Vaughn, why should you?

MUSE: You’re not Stevie Ray Vaughn.

WRITER: It’s your job to encourage my artistic pursuits, not throw cold water. And even SRV had to learn.

MUSE:  Speaking of which, isn’t it about time you got your butt back to work on the rewrite of The War God’s Son?

WRITER: Almost. There’s still some continuity research to do.

MUSE: You’re stalling.

WRITER: Am not. I had the final battle location way too far south. Plus I had
            assumed that Yoshiie led the final campaign alone. Not so. His father,
Yoriyoshi, was present as well. Which does, as you well know, affect the middle
section.

MUSE: Really? The old guy was pushing eighty.

WRITER: Tough old bird. But I do have to reconcile how he was seeing portents of
            victory back in Kamakura when he was supposed to be in Mutsu. The only
            primary source is 1) Rare and 2) In Japanese. Sansome only goes so far, but
            I’ll get what I need.

MUSE: Well…okay. But that’s not a proper D major, you know.

WRITER: I do know. It’s a D7. Next I’ll practice the turnaround. Want to heckle?

MUSE: I’ll pass. Just be gentle with that poor guitar, okay?

WRITER: I’ll do my best.

MUSE: You better. Otherwise we’re both wasting our time.

 
FADE OUT.