Appreciate the local folk supporting Dyscrasia Fiction, at work, in the dojo, and in Kroger!
Thursday, September 4, 2025
Sunday, August 31, 2025
Aikido Promotions
Saturday August 30th, my son and I passed Aikido testing (now Shodan and Nidan, respectively ... aka 1st and 2nd degree black belts). Thanks for all the support from Mushinkan Dojo (Q, Chris, Daryl Everding and Hanna Everding, and Sensei Dirk Domaschko, and many more). The journey started for us ~2011 give or take, and still continues.
Daryl sports a Dsycrasia Fiction shirt for support
Connor is learning how to fold a hakama
Monday, August 18, 2025
Gen Con 2025 - Writer Symposium Selfies
Table of Contents:
Writer Symposium Author Selfies
John Scalzi – Guest of Honor Writer
Maurice Broaddus – Author and Chair of WS
Olivia Sailor – Lead Organizer Writers Symposium
Byron Leavitt – Diemension Games Writer
CSE Cooney - Author
Gilles Plantin - Monolith Creative Director & Jeszika Le Vye - Artist
Tim Waggoner – Horror & Conan Writer
Chris A Jackson - Author
Aaron Rosenberg - Author
Michael Stackpole – Sci Fi & Conan Writer
Jim Zub – Conan Comics Writer
Sean CW Korsgaard - Battleborn!
Gen Con 2025 - SELindberg Writers Symposium Panel Review
Table of Contents:
Gen Con 2025 - SELindberg Writers Symposium Panels Review
Remembering Howard Andrew Jones
Thursday, 11:00 AM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Marriott Ballroom 4
Join us as we honor and celebrate the life, work, and memory of Howard Andrew Jones, one of our own.
Featuring: Bryan Young, C. S. E. Cooney, Carlos Hernandez, Chris A. Jackson, Erik Scott de Bie, Erin M. Evans, Gregory A. Wilson, Katherine Monasterio, Matt Forbeck, Sean CW Korsgaard, Seth Lindberg
- We announced the Howard Andrew Jones Memorial Travel Grants (for enabling BIPOC and first-time panelists/authors to attend); thanks to the 2025 Writer's Symposium organizing committee
- Also, some homeage pictures of the Skull's Zigguratt (Goodman Game's Vendor booth) and of the piano outside the Writer's Symposium green room (this haunts me, but I love it. Miss you Howard)See previous Memorial Obiturarys, Memorial Panels:
From Battles to Fisticuffs
Saturday, 4:00 PM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Marriott Ballroom 1
Bar fights, professional fights, ambushes, duels, full-scale battles - how do we do them justice? How do we craft a physical confrontation in our scenes?
Featuring: J.B. Garner, James A. Hunter, Richard Lee Byers, Seth Lindberg, Stephen Kozeniewski
Community Building
Thursday, 4:00 PM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Boston
Writers who have a community thrive better in their creative work. Come listen to our panelists talk about the communities they participate in, best practices, and how to get started.
Featuring: DaVaun Sanders, Kelli Fitzpatrick, Rob Cameron, Seth Lindberg
Monster as Protagonist
Friday, 4:00 PM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Marriott Ballroom 2
Sometimes, it's the monster's turn to be the star of the show. How do you write for when your protagonist is a bloodsucking fiend, an evil genius, or a shambling corpse?
Featuring: Daniel Kraus, Erin Roberts, Khaldoun Khelil, Seth Lindberg, Shveta Thakrar
Sword & Sorcery
Friday, 10:00 AM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Marriott Ballroom 4
From Robert E. Howard to Howard Andrew Jones, explore the highs, lows, and two-fisted pulpy action of this fantasy subgenre.
Featuring: Bryan Young, Michael A. Stackpole, Richard Lee Byers, Sean CW Korsgaard, Seth Lindberg
Magic Systems 101
Friday, 5:00 PM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Marriott Ballroom 2
Join us as we discuss how to develop a magic system for your game or story and how to ensure you don't break your own rules.
Featuring: Aaron Rosenberg, Daniel Myers, Danni Williams, James A. Hunter, Seth Lindberg
Nilah Magruder Spotlight
Saturday, 1:00 PM EDT for 1 hr Marriott: Marriott Ballroom 4
Join our Writers Symposium featured guest in conversation for a special one-on-one Q&A session
Nilah Magruder and Seth Lindberg
Sunday, August 17, 2025
UK Roadtrip - Literary Inspirations from Tolkien, Shelley, to the Ancients
This Summer, Heidi and I took a Rick Steve's Tour (best 14 Days of England, highly recommended); it started in Bath, and we arrived a day early since we had arranged for a separate private tour from Daniel to see Stonehenge (which was absent from the awesome Rick Steve's itinerary we had signed up for). Had an absolute blast. This captures highlights related to writing:
1) Mary Shelley's Frankenstein; The Modern Prometheus - 1818
A plaque in Bath commemorates Mary Shelley's writing of Frankenstein (she was 18 years old!). Later, when we went through Oxford and went through the amazing Treasures of the Bodleian Library, we saw several of the hand-written scripts of Frankenstein with her edits, and a portrait painted from he deathmask (painted by Reginald Easton, watercolor on ivory, circa 1857)
2) Other Treasures of the Bodleian: Robert Hooke's 1665 Micrographia & Jane Austin, and Lewis Carroll
The Bodleian Library holds a first edition of Robert Hooke's Micrographia. Hooke is a hero amongst mechanical engineers and rheologists (all hail the Spring constant) and microscopists. His drawings showed the world stuff they had never seen before, and the image data was digestible to all who could get their hands on the printed books. This is the second time I saw a 1665 edition - the first being in 2012 when I gave a lecture at the McCrone Research Institute in Chicago.
3) To write, one needed pencils! Derwent Pencil Museum in Keswick
The science and engineering behind pencil making is kind of fun. To note one story, Charles Fraser-Smith commissioned special pencils under the Official Secrets Acts of WWII. The RAF pilots got them, and they were fitted with maps and compasses to enable escape from behind enemy lines.
4) Church of England, King James Bible champion also wrote Daemonologie book
The trip fully illuminated the splintering of the Catholic Church (we visited many ransacked and ruined Abbeys and Minsters); soon after the formation of the Church of England, folks got their own readable Bibles (i.e., written in English, not Latin) from King James I (same as King James VI of Scotland). Not only did he initiate/commission the project for the bible, he actually did write a book on Demonology (largely espousing the torture of witches). A statue/relief in Oxford commorates his role in the making of 2 books.
5) Rosetta Stone - British Museum [~200BC]
Excerpt from Wikipedia: "The Rosetta Stone is a stele of granodiorite inscribed with three versions of a decree issued in 196 BC during the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt, on behalf of King Ptolemy V Epiphanes. The top and middle texts are in Ancient Egyptian using hieroglyphic and Demotic scripts, respectively, while the bottom is in Ancient Greek. The decree has only minor differences across the three versions, making the Rosetta Stone key to deciphering the Egyptian scripts."
This stone enabled the decipherment and translation of hieroglyphs. It is so popular now, no contemporary human canreally see the actual stone up close via the mob of tourists.
6) Legion of the Shadows - York Minster Museum under the Church
Karl Edward Wagner used the legend of the Ninth Legion (Legio IX Hispana), the infamous legion that went abruptly missing in 108 AD. to write his Robert E Howard pastiche of Bran Mak Morn. The legion was last recorded in York, they had left their signature on bricks viewable in the Roman Fortress Museum under the York Minster Church.
7) The 'Tolkien Door' at Stow on the Wold Doors of Durin, also known as the West-gate of Moria
The north porch of St. Edward's Church in Stow on the Wold, Gloucestershire, is home to a wooden door which looks like something from a fairy story. Indeed, rumour has it that the door was the inspiration behind J.R.R. Tolkien's J. R. R. Tolkien's Doors of Durin, the west gate of Moria that appears in a scene in the The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.The door is made of dark wood with studded panels, and it has an old oil lamp hanging above it. The door is quite small, and it is said that only a hobbit could fit through it.Tolkien was known to visit the area while he studied at, and later became a professor at, Oxford University (Merton College). Much as we'd love to believe that the door was instrumental in the creation of the Doors or Durin, the claims have never been authenticated.The north porch of the church was built about 300 years ago and young yew saplings were planted to enhance its entrance. Today these trees are now part of the architraves for the door and make this one of the most photographed doors in the Cotswolds!St Edward's Church is just a short walk from the Market Square and the magical yew tree door and stained glass windows are well worth visiting.
8) Harry Potter
My kids were into the novels more than me. Anyway, it was neat to learn how Oxford was designed (40+ independent universities forming a city, Lewis Carroll, C S Lewis, Tolkien, and more sprung from here). The design of the houses in Harry Potter were inspired by this, and filming for the movies occurred in Oxford and York, amongst other places. Picture below captures Oxford, a train station in York, and the Shambles streets of York.
9) Stanway House
The Stanway House is rich with literary history.
"Stanway House in the Cotswolds was a frequent summer retreat for J.M. Barrie, the author of Peter Pan. He was known to spend time there during the 1920s, and even up to 1932. While staying there, he wrote parts of Peter Pan and also formed a local cricket team called the Allahakbarries, which included other notable writers like Arthur Conan Doyle, H.G. Wells, A.A. Milne, and P.G. Wodehouse", according to Country Walkers [and our tour guide].
10) Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain - Welsh Mythology
Lloyd
Alexander’s The Chronicles of Prydain was the first book series I read. The
image of the Horned King on the cover of The Book of Three, plus the
Cauldron Born deathless warriors, had a huge impact on my psyche. Lloyd Alexander did not have a specific Welsh geography that inspired him, but drew heavily on the Mabinogion. As we toured Wales, we stayed/toured in Conwy and Caernarfon, I re-read the first two in the series.
11) Pre-historic Stones: Stonehenge [300BC], Avebury [2800BC], Castlerigg [3200BC]
At Stonehenge, thanks to the prodding of my buddy Dirk, I took a selfie video of me chanting the Charm of Making, Merlin's chants in the 1981 Excalibur movie. That video will not be shared here! Anyway, touring the ancient stones is a wonderful experience. Stonehenge; being the most monumental in size and height; Avebury, being the largest diameter-enough so to encompass an entire town! and Castlerigg; being the most intimate (in that it is more remote, visitors can approach the stones).
Thursday, August 14, 2025
Battleborn Magazine
Simulcast on Black Gate today! Click here,
Add comments on Black Gate!
Battleborn is an upcoming action-packed sword and sorcery magazine curated by Sean CW Korsgaard and published by IronAge Media. Read this to learn the scope of this supercharged magazine, the crowdfunding campaign needed to make it a reality (Indiegogo Aug 1st!), and learn Black Gate Exclusive scoops!
As an editor at Baen, Sean CW Korsgaard championed the Hanuvar series, and was mentored by the author, the late Howard Andrew Jones. Sean CW Korsgaard states that Battleborn is emulating Howard's run on Tales from the Magician's Skull, both in style and in terms of authors and artists tapped. The magazine will feature a new Hanuvar tale from the late author, and from first issue to last issue, this will be on the masthead: "Howard Andrew Jones - Editor Emeritus."
Expect:
- Contemporary authors
- Classic reprints
- And, perhaps adding to a Heavy Metal flair, each issue will have a short comic crafted by Schyler Hernstrom.
- If all stretch goals are met, they will have room for 20k words more per issue... which WILL be open to submissions.
Saturday, August 9, 2025
Immolating Ember Appears in Savage Realms Monthly - July 2025
"Immolating Ember" appears in the July 2025 issue of Savage Realms Monthly!
It includes an interview with me too!
Available now (click here!)
The snarky seductress, Ember, has lead roles in two recent anthologies:
- "Embracing Ember" (2022). A Book of Blades Vol I (Rogues in the House Podcast)
- "One Hive. Two Queens" (2022). Terra Incognita (DMR Books, edited by Douglas Draa)
Ember also appears as a minor character in:
- "Breaching Earth's Womb" (2023). A Book of Blades Vol. 2! (Rogues in the House Podcast)
- "Raising Daughters" (2020). Whetstone Amateur Sword & Sorcery Magazine Issue #2
Sometime in 2026, the collection Gave's Daughter will feature her, and her sisters Leech and Melanie!
Cover art from Bastien Lecouffe Deharme. Ember is the one on the right!
What Rough Beast? - Interview with Byrn Hammond
What Rough Beast? - Interview with Byrn Hammond - Simulcast on Black Gate
Blazing New Trails: The What Rough Beast? Campaign, and an Interview with Author Bryn Hammond
Waste Flowers and What Rough Beast? Tale of Goatskin, written by Bryn Hammond, both with cover art from Goran Gligović[/caption]
Black Gate has been tracking the inception and growth of New Edge Sword & Sorcery Magazine, starting with Micheal Harrington’s 2022 interview with Oliver Brackenbury (champion and editor of NESS), through 2023 with NESS's first two magazine releases (also Mele’s review of #1), and then into 2024 with NESS’s first book “Beating Heart and Battle Axes and its two-novella combo book Double-Edged Sword & Sorcery, and (deep breath)... most recently... NESS's publication of a NEW Jirel of Joiry! (2025).
NESS crowdfunds 4 New Novellas (link)!
Surprise, NESS continues to blaze flaming hot new trails! Starting this September 9th 4PM and running through September 30th, NESS pitches four novellas. The first advertised is What Rough Beast?, written by Bryn Hammond (with cover art by Goran Gligović, and interior illustrations by Linnea Sterte). As shown in the cover images above, this first novella is another Tale of Goatskin and has the same cover artist as Waste Flowers, Goran Gligović, who was featured in a mini-interview on Black Gates' previously.
Waste Flowers
Goatskin the goat nomad and her bandit love Sister Chaos guide merchants from Samarkand across the Gobi desert to the Mongols. But their caravan veers from one weird assault to weirder and worse. Who is behind this grotesquerie? Will they lose their way, or even lose their minds?
What Rough Beast?
Among the yak nomads, rowdy, restless young have thrown themselves into a cult of were-beasts ridden by unknown spirits, and they stalk Goatskin. They feel evil: evil by the lights of the intruder Temple, or by the banned old beliefs? And the shaman Goatskin searches for – a sad old man who set off on a quest his people call insane – what beast does he impossibly grapple? In the starry high meadows, what inhabits the night? Whose evil?
The other three novellas in the campaign promise wondrous, contemporary adventure, as per NESS's mission. But here we highlight Bryn Hammond's contribution. Learn her muses and motivations, why she splatters paint on canvases, and learn why you'll want to follow Goatskin into the haunted Gobi desert and beyond as she battles seriously weird, undead armies and dragons!
Read this, learn inside scoops, follow Goatskin!
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