Yeah, it’s a commercial for a beer, but it’s also a perfect master class in storytelling. Setting, characterization, conflict/motivation, peril, emotional climax, satisfying resolution, denouement. Themes: friendship, loyalty, love. All squeezed into one minute. Not a second is wasted on anything that doesn’t drive the narrative.This is how you do Story.
Category: writing.
the “be a space marine” charity tally.
You crazy kids wasted no time claiming the naming rights to the Formerly Anonymous Squad in the Bad-Ass Platoon of Badassitude. We ran over the count a wee bit, but I’ll make some space on the platoon roster because you shouldn’t be penalized for my lack of orderly system when it comes to tallying contest…
want to be a space marine in a frontlines novel?
I am currently writing what will become the fourth Frontlines novel , titled “Chains of Command”. Without giving away any plot details, I can tell you that Chains of Command will feature a group of folks I’m calling “the Bad-Ass Platoon of Bad-Assitude”. I’ve filled the command slots with some recurring characters that you may…
obligatory 2014 recap.
I really like it when I type up an end-of-year retrospective blog post and find that I really didn’t have a damn thing to complain about in the past twelve months. 2013 was great. 2014 was even better by every measurable metric except for the fact that I didn’t get to see my family in…
invasion! der! sterne!
There’s a cover for the German-language edition of Terms of Enlistment! And a release date: June 15, 2015, from Heyne. Here’s the link to the German Amazon page.) They shortened Andrew’s name to “Andy” and took some creative license with the title. (“Invasion of the Stars”, presumably to sound Star Wars-y. The German name for…
you should totally support this anthology.
I’m a big fan of crowd-funded fiction anthologies. In fact, my second professional fiction sale ever was to a crowd-funded anthology, Alex Shvartsman’s “Unidentified Funny Objects”. (That was the short story “Cake Whores From Mars”, written on a dare from Chuck Wendig, and a crowd favorite at readings.) The UFO sale was a major motivation…
“angles of attack” has an official cover.
Hey, you! Yes, you! Wanna see the cover for Frontlines #3, “Angles of Attack”? OF COURSE YOU DO. I am biased, of course, but I think it’s a pretty bad-ass cover, and probably my favorite Frontlines cover yet. “Angles of Attack” will be out on April 21st in Kindle, paperback, and audio formats.
audiobook review: “terms of enlistment”.
There’s a pretty sweet review of the audio version of Terms of Enlistment over at Audio Book Reviewer. You should go check it out. The audio version of the third Frontlines book is currently in production, from what I hear. I am really happy with the work of Luke Daniels, who read the first two…
it printed in cuneiform.
That monstrosity is a Brother WP-1 word processor. I recently found this picture online, and boy, did it trigger some memories. I got one of those babies in the late 1980s, when I was just out of high school. I kept it throughout my four years of military service, and it got dragged to every…
“lines of departure”, the goodreads choice awards, and you.
Last year, TERMS OF ENLISTMENT made the SF shortlist in the 2013 Goodreads Choice Awards. This year, LINES OF DEPARTURE has managed the same trick in the 2014 Goodreads Choice Awards, which is nice. If you read the book and liked it enough (if you in fact LIKED IT BETTER THAN THE OTHERS), then by…