First, the Rider’s Revenge Trilogy is part of Kobo’s September 40% Off Book Sale. So if you haven’t read the whole series, check that out. (Direct link to the series here and use code BOXSEPT at checkout.)

If you have already read it, there are plenty of other finished series or box sets that are on sale as well. They even have audiobooks in this one.

Second, if you need some great epic fantasy books to read that are character-driven and haven’t already discovered them, I highly recommend Michelle West. I started with The Hidden City and ended up reading all of the books in a few months, which given their size was an impressive feat. It’s a rare author who can keep readers engaged for that many books in a row.

If you do like it enough to keep going, though, do a search online to figure out the reading order because chronologically you’ll want to stop that series after book three and move to the other related series before going back to finish that one.

And finally while I’m here you may be wondering what’s up with me and writing another book. (If not, you can click away now.)

It’s a good question.

Part of the issue is that the Rider’s Revenge trilogy is complete so I don’t have this “must finish this series” self-pressure to keep going. And since no one is pestering me for more…

(It’s a weird horror I have of being one of those writers whose readers won’t leave them alone and demand the next book immediately like the author doesn’t have a life to live or their own interests in terms of what they want to write next, but being on the opposite side of that coin where people read your books but then are fine to move on and never say they want more is hard, too.)

Also, when I try to figure out the next thing to write I have about ten directions I could go but none that’s driving me. So I spend a lot of time thinking about what I would write next and developing at least three very different worlds in my head, but I haven’t started writing any of them. (Or maybe I have, actually. Or that’s another three novel ideas that were poking at me.)

The good news I guess is that I think I may finally be past the “what if someone hates me” block I had shortly after finishing the last book in the Rider’s series when I started paying too much attention to the public opinions of my SFF peers.

(Nothing directed at me personally. Just their vocal opinions of how if someone likes this book then they’re clearly a horrible person. Or if someone writes about that thing then they’re clearly a horrible person. Or seeing someone very prominent in the industry mock their self-published audiobook clients for bad writing. Things like that. It doesn’t have to be directed at me to get under my skin.)

(Honestly, I really need to stay away from watching SFF discussions on Twitter because if you do that long enough you’ll become convinced that you can’t write a single word without being some sort of -ist or horrible person. For example, I like to write about what people eat and include descriptions of their size, does that make me fatphobic? It’s hard to remember that the very small group of vocal individuals on social media are not the entirety of readers who mostly are like me and read what they like and live their lives and don’t talk much about it and don’t dive too deep on all the issues.)

Anyway.

I also know that I need to write more books under this name if I want this name to sell steady and gain fans. And that I need to do so on a regular basis. And that price promotions, etc. are key to driving sales.

But it’s all tricky when I have non-fiction that sells at full-price month in and month out and I know that one hour spent writing fantasy will earn me $X but one hour spent writing non-fiction will earn me 10 times $X.

Plus there are days where publishing can feel like swimming in a cesspool full of piranhas, so finding success at it is it’s own problem. One I’m not sure I want.

Ah, to be completely under the radar but making a very good living and getting to spend my days with my dog as my sole company…What job lets you have that?

Sorry. Probably TMI. Especially since I hate showing any weakness, negativity, etc. in public. But that’s what’s up. I am writing. I write about 325K words a year on average. Just not…this. And I honestly at this point don’t know whether I’ll suddenly write five novels next year that put onto paper all these stories I’ve been percolating in my head or whether I’ll end up writing another book about securities regulations.

First, just in case you somehow stumbled upon this blog by accident and hadn’t already at least read Rider’s Revenge or in case you have a friend who you’d really love to recommend the book to but don’t want them to spend their hard-earned money, Rider’s Revenge is free for the month of February.

Second, I’ve been playing around with creating a list of some of my favorite reads in fantasy as part of putting together an Aer.io store. If you want to check it out, it’s here.

If you read in print and are in the U.S. or Canada you can actually order the books on the site. Otherwise it’s just a good place to see a list of books I’ve enjoyed recently.

Not all are newly-published. For example, I read that entire Sharon Shinn series this year even though it’s been out for fifteen years.

I tried to only list books that were part of series where the entire series was enjoyable for me.

It’s interesting, there are a lot of books on my shelves that I liked enough to keep, but where maybe I enjoyed the first book in the series a lot and read the rest of the series but then the rest of the series didn’t work as well for me or the last book in the series didn’t nail the landing enough for me to recommend. (I’m thinking of one in particular where the multiple time lines didn’t quite come together in book five but I read the whole series.)

Also, weirdly enough there are certain authors who are almost a must-buy for me (or actually I’ve conned my mom into buying them now) who I didn’t list because even though I still read all of their books I wouldn’t actually recommend those books to others.

One of my long-time favorite authors seems to have found a love for writing characters who have difficult accents and so 90% of the dialogue in their recent books are in those accents and it’s just…a slog sometimes to get through. I still like their storytelling and characters but I would completely understand if someone picked up one of their current books and asked what I was thinking recommending it.

Also, I have a ton of favorites on my shelves from my teen years but I’m not sure they aged well so don’t want to recommend them without re-reading. I remember loving the Belgariad as a teen, but when I tried to re-read it last year it was a no for me. (There’s a scene where the knight character crushes a young lion to death when he could’ve just let it run away and it was struggling to get free and I just…No. Didn’t even register with me when I was 13 or whatever, but this time it really did.)

So, maybe there’s something there for you, maybe not. I’m always struggling to find new authors so figured I’d share in case anyone else is as well.

(And please don’t think that just because I mentioned a few things that I didn’t like as a reader that that in any way makes me think that my own writing or even what I write about is above reproach. Just like not all authors are ones that I as a reader will enjoy, I know that I am not for all readers either. Such is life.)

Also, in case anyone who reads this is an author themselves, here’s another list I put together on Aer.io of my favorite writing advice books.

I am not by nature a short story reader or writer. I prefer to get down in there and really live with a character. But every once in a while I have an idea that lends itself to a short story.

Like my recent short story, By Your Side When the Sun Sets, that was about an old dragonrider and his dragon who is starting to forget him and what to do about that which was inspired by my having an aging dog who makes me sad every time she struggles to stand up.

Usually what I do with these stories is I submit them to the Writers of the Future writing contest, maybe try a couple other short story markets, and then let them rot away on my hard drive. But I realized that I actually had enough of those short stories that I could publish them as a collection.

Now, because I view novels and short stories as two different beasts, so to speak, I put the short stories out under an old pen name of mine, M.H. Lee. But I thought I’d share the existence of the collection here just in case anyone is both a short story and a novel reader.

So if that’s you, then you can find When The Time Comes and Other Stories on major retailers. And one of the stories, The Taste of Memory, which is about creativity and trauma and memory, you can read for free.

(Because this is 2020 and nothing is simple this year, the story collection is stuck in publishing on Nook but will hopefully push through. Of course, I’ve been saying that since the 15th. And the short story is currently free everywhere but Amazon but I have asked nicely so that could change at any moment as well. I tell ya, the writing is actually the easy part of this gig.)

I just deleted my Twitter account. I’ve decided that Twitter and I just do not mix well. It’s not a social hangout for me and recently all I was posting about was COVID-19 awareness. (It’s serious folks. Stay home when you can, wear a mask when you can’t.) Before that I’d been on something like a two-year break from the place because I find the environment relatively toxic.

And with so much cancelling happening in SFF right now I really had no interest in going through the list of everyone I’ve followed over time and deciding whether their transgressions were legitimate enough for me to unfollow them or not. So I’m done.

It’s a great place to get the most current information on issues but it’s also very unfiltered in terms of “does this perpetuate stress or harm to others” and I just quite frankly find it exhausting. Keep enjoying it if it’s for you, but you won’t find me there anymore.

(And the only reason I post this is because I think they reuse user names after a period of time so I don’t want there to be any confusion out there about my having a Twitter account.)

Just a quick note to let you know that the Rider’s Revenge Trilogy is now available in a gigantic omnibus for those who are print fans.  I suspect the individual books are an easier read, because they’re not two and a half inches thick like this behemoth, but it does make the price of the print versions more accessible. (About $30 USD for all three novels combined.)

Should be available (at least for order) anywhere you buy print books but here’s the Amazon US link.

(Ignore the book on the bottom, that’s just another little project of mine. Unless, of course, you want to learn about Microsoft Excel…)

In other news, I think I may finally be turning to writing a new fantasy series. I detoured into non-fiction and cozy mysteries for a bit there, but I think it’s about time to return to my first love. Now to just figure out which idea to write…

For anyone who hasn’t yet read the entire Rider’s Revenge Trilogy, it’s part of a big SFF promo on Kobo now through May 15th and you can get the entire trilogy in ebook format for only $3.99.  Here’s the direct link.

Also, if you’ve already read the entire trilogy, then you may want to check out the rest of the promotion. Lots of options and some are up to 80% off.