Not Above The Law, the 7th book in my Cole Wright series is available for preorder now. Due out on June 20th. It will be available in both paperback and hardback then too.
I have another Cole Wright short story, “Stillness”, just about prepped and ready to go. I should have that up here to read for free for a week or two before Not Above The Law comes out. You know, like a promotional tool, but it’s a free read for a while, so drop by around the middle of June for that.
Of course, if you’re hungry for Cole Wright short stories, remember that the first collection No Lack of Courage is available now in ebook and print. Link here. It’s a fine collection of stories, if I do say so myself. Something for everyone. Well, everyone who likes action thriller mystery short stories.
My Cole Wright series is now at six novels, with the seventh due in July (more on that in another post). Kevin J. Anderson mentioned in a seminar I was attending that most series don’t take off until book six. Maybe that’ll be book seven for me (or eight, or nine, grin – yes I will keep writing them).
Through 2022 each time I released a new Cole Wright novel, I also put out a short story, as an ebook, a print book and, for a limited time, free to read here on the website.
There was also a novella Cold Highway, and a limited free story with that. That’s enough stories for a collection, I figure. Even though releasing a collection kind of effectively kills the sales of those individual stories. It’s nice to see them gathered together like this.
ebook $6.99 (preorder for March 20th), paperback $16.99, hardback $21.99 (both available now)
Contents:
Dark Fields
Schedule Interruption
The Forest Doesn’t Care
One Little Broken Leg
The Handler
Cardinals
A Steep Climb
What Do You Say Gus?
Cold Highway
Probably a good time to mention that the seventh novel in the series is almost out for preorder, for release in June.
More news on that soon.
Then there’s other writing happening. The next Captain Arlon Stoddard novel Tramp Steamers has been copyedited and proofed and we’re looking at scheduling that for October, though the next Karnish River Navigations novel Rorqual Saitu is complete, just awaiting those edits. We were hoping to have that out in August, but we might switch those around.
And then with the day-to-day writing, I’m deep in the heart of a new book which started out as, I thought in my naivety, a short story that might break 5000 words (think twenty pages) and is now somewhere north of 30,000 words. Yes, it will be another novel. This is good news for fans of my Morgenfeld Saga, on which nothing has happened for a few years (busy with other series as you see above) – the new book is tentatively titled The Wintermas Paintings and might even be out before the end of the next year.
At the risk of extending that naivety, I thought I’d pop in the draft of Chapter One below for any who might be interested. This is raw, remember, not tinkered with, not copyedited, not even proofed. But it might still give a feel for where this book is going.
Art not final – just an ai version of what it thinks of Morgenfeld’s Tower of Bats.
The Wintermas Paintings
Chapter One
Despite the size of the space, the air in the old cavernous hall was musty and damp and thick.
Jason Trone shivered, pressed up to one of the windows. The glass was cold, and from somewhere came angry bellows.
Someone shouting his name.
Far off for now. He had a moment.
Jason sat on a low wooden bench seat. It was hard and had once been polished to a fine shine. The lustre was long gone, and the vanish was cracked and pitted and discolored. Probably oak, with a strong grain and a few knots. The legs were still strong.
Lying on the bench were the spoils of his plunder. Trinkets and baubles mostly. Two iron necklaces with gold plating that was already wearing off. Some glass sapphires and emeralds set in brass brooches. The pins on two were snapped. A pair of pearl earrings that might have been genuine, but they wouldn’t fetch much.
He scooped them back into his soft leather satchel. It had been a gift from his grandmother and wouldn’t she be disappointed now with the use he was putting it to.
Jason sighed.
The windows behind stood thirty feet high. They hadn’t been cleaned in decades. A dust patina lay across them, and bright green lichens spread on some of the panes, with darker green mosses looking lush and vibrant in edges and corners of the framing.
Jason wiped at one of the windows, removing just enough dust to be able to see through. The next part of the building stood about forty feet away, and he was about level with the edge of the roof. There were rows of windows, leading down three, no four, stories. The brickwork was festooned with dead vines, as if someone had cut the poor plant off at the roots.
An orange cat strolled along the parapet–the building’s walls rose higher than the roof, so there were gutterings hidden behind. The cat stopped and turned to lick at its side, stripes showing and tail flicking.
If Jason could get around to where the cat was now, then that would give him more options. The question was how to reach it.
Looking over the hall again, Jason marveled. It would have been quite impressive back in its day.
The vaults of the ceiling was a good forty feet from the wooden floor. The remains of chandelliers hung, sad and drooping.
Across from the windows there was a long mezzanine balcony, rather than a wall. Stiff plaster pillars still showing signs of their original gilding held the floor in place, and the railing was complex and twisted. Probably wrought iron. It had once been painted white, but now the only remaining paint was a few chips, and rust showed.
Perhaps it had been a ball room, or even a throne room. Perhaps there had been huge thick woollen curtains over the windows and where he sat now had been occupied by a stage. There might have been performances held of Crespin’s The Draper’s Revenge, or any number of Peart’s complicated plays. Or chamber quartet shows.
Jason closed his eyes a moment, imagining the hall filled with chairs, the audience chattering away until a master of ceremonies stood at the stage front and cleared their throat.
Another bellow from the distance brought him out of his reverie.
Closer.
What he hadn’t figured on, when he began fleeing with his purloined jewelery, was getting chased by constabulary with the mindset of zealots. That, with finding his escape route blocked, had thrown him into disarray.
Probably shouldn’t have even taken this moment to catch his breath.
Jason scooped the pauper’s jewels back into his satchel. One missed and fell to the floor. One of the faux-sapphire brooches. It glass jewel glinted with a fabulous blue.
With a quiet curse, Jason slipped off the bench and reached around for the jewel. An big black spider scuttled away. Jason caught a glimpse of its tunneled web, leading back from a hole beneath the window framing.
As he stood, he heard another bellow.
“Jason Trone! Stay right where you are.”
The voice echoed around the hall.
Turning, Jason saw a hefty officer just at the entry door at the far end.. Dressed in a dark blue uniform with gold buttons and brocades. His hat was slightly askew and his mustache was thick.
Another officer came up behind him. A woman. Smaller, with narrowed eyes and an angry mouth.
“Stay right there,” the male officer said. “You’re nicked.”
Jason tucked the flap of his satchel in.
“Don’t think about it son.” The officer took another step.
Jason slung the satchel over his shoulder.
“Get on your knees,” the female officer said, coming around, drawing her baton.
Jason ran. He sprinted right at one of the old plaster pillars.
A trip north of the border takes Cole Wright into the heart of snowbound Canada. Friendly people, vast distances, tough vehicles, isolation.
When a breakdown looms, Wright finds himself caught in the white, compacted landscape. A road thirty feet wide, hemmed in by the piled up ridges left by snowploughs. And an endless forest that could hide just about anything.
Unfriendly territory. Dangerous places.
A Cole Wright novella that focuses down on a single moment where the slightest error could be his last.
Available now as an ebook, $3.99, and in print $7.99/$10.99 – Link here.
It’s been a big year for my Cole Wright character, from the first short story “Dark Fields“, and the first novel The Arrival, we’ve put out a bunch more novels and stories, and now, the first novella. This has been a labour over the last several years to get these up and running. The sixth novel Zero Kills will be out in December (available for preorder now), and I’m hard at work on the seventh right now, and hoping to have that out around May next year. More on that as the time approaches.
Next year we’ll be putting some of the novels together into box sets – that’ll be two box sets, of books 1 -3 and of books 4-6. We’ll also have a collection of all the short stories, and include Cold Highway in there too. And some bonus content that we’re still tinkering with.
For a little change and a little challenge, I took on participating in NaNoWriMo this year. The background to taking that on comes from my day job workplace, a public library, where the youth team are working to encourage young writers to participate. I’m going to run a couple of workshops for in the Youth Space too.
NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month, held every November. The challenge is to write a 50,000 word novel in the thirty days. That works out around 1667 words a day. In any given month I write more than that so it’s manageable. This is the first time, though, that I’ve started a novel intentionally on the first of the month, targeting a finish by the last day. Mostly my novels come in around 60,000 words. Sometimes they spill over to 70,000, even 75,000.
NaNoWriMo is a funny thing, though. Signing up is cool and it’s nifty recording my word count each day as I progress toward that target. They have pep talks and encouragement, but sometimes miss the mark.
The first one I came received, from a well-published and award-winning writer talked about how “writing is hard”. Really? Sorry NaNoWriMo, that’s no pep talk. That sounds discouraging. I did read the whole of the ‘pep’ talk and it wasn’t really to my taste, wasn’t really talking to me.
I would have loved something about how writing is fun. It’s a blast. You’re making up stuff just for the heck of it. Because you can. I would suggest that if it’s hard you might be doing it wrong, or coming at it from the wrong approach. And if it’s not fun, go do something that is.
Last year I railed against an article in the Sunday Star Times* titled if “Writing is torture and you hate it, you might be a writer”. What is the deal out there with so many people writing about how tough writing is? Let’s encourage writers rather than put them off.
*[In previous years I also railed against the T&C of the SSTimes story contest which were a rights grab. I noticed this year that they’ve updated the terms to drop that grab. Good on them, finally. Sorry I didn’t notice this until the contest closed – I guess I’d become cynical about it over the years.]
On a lighter note, I am having a blast writing this novel. It’s fun and different and once it’s had a once-over and a copy-edit and a proof-read, it should be out sometime in the first half of next year.
Oh, yes, about next year. I’m looking at publishing a little less. Publishing ten novels (albiet one of them a short novel), a few novellas and numerous short stories this year has been good, but I still need to learn marketing better, and social media [talking about something that’s hard – try social media… oh, what, that’s easy? I wish I found it easy… it doesn’t come naturally to me, so I need to practice I guess 🙂 ]. I do have three novels in various stages of preparation to be released through the first half of the year, likely to be February, April and June. Another focus next year will be collections – I have a whole lot of stories that I’ll gather together. Including all the Cole Wright shorts from this year. Considering the title No Lack of Courage. Cheesy? Corny? I don’t know. It’ll be nice to have them all together in a single book.
The last novel for this year will be the sixth in the Cole Wright thriller series, Zero Kills. It should be up for preorder soon. The cover it a little different from the original, but matches the story better. (cheeky me, I’ll reuse that original image on another book, maybe next year).
I’ll have another short story – “Junkyard Mornings” up for free in early December for a week or so. You know, marketing and promotion. Reader magnet or what have you.
With my last post, I was deep in the heart of writing the ninth Captain Arlon Stoddard novel, Dead Ringers, and as I write this, I’m deep in the heart of writing the seventh Cole Wright novel (as yet untitled), which shows that I go too long between posts here.
Cold Highway – A Cole Wright Novella – out now
A trip north of the border takes Cole Wright into the heart of snowbound Canada. Friendly people, vast distances, tough vehicles, isolation.
When a breakdown looms, Wright finds himself caught in the white, compacted landscape. A road thirty feet wide, hemmed in by the piled up ridges left by snowploughs. And an endless forest that could hide just about anything.
Unfriendly territory. Dangerous places.
A Cole Wright novella that focuses down on a single moment where the slightest error could be his last.
With “Cold Highway” the first Cole Wright novella came on November 20th, and the sixth novel Zero Kills will be out on December 20th, it’s a busy time for my little thriller series.
Stay tuned for more news – another free story in December, and plans for Cole Wright and other series next year.
“Cold Highway” is available now. $3.99 ebook / $10.99 print.
Cardinals – A Cole Wright Short Story – also out now
Lieutenant Ione Anders of the Spokane Police Department stares at a blade jutting from one of the tires on her new issue vehicle.
Looks like the start of another one of those days.
A day that proves full of surprises.
A Cole Wright story with a difference, putting him right there in the action as he tags along.
Full list of contents here – cool to see that I’m sharing that with another New Zealander – Melanie Harding-Shaw. Kind of humbled to be there alongside her – Mel is one of the shining lights of the NZ Speculative Fiction Scene..
My Aurealis Award Finalist novella from Analog last year, “Problem Landing” is now also available as a standalone in print and as an ebook. Universal Book Link here.
Toughing out life on Mars, Ciananti Burrows finds herself constantly repairing failing equipment and pushing research aside. But when new arrivals declare an issue with their landing vessel, all those learned repair skills might come in handy.
They might even save some lives.
For some reason I seem to give my protagonists names beginning with C – Ciananti, Cody, Cole Wright.
July will see the release of Cole Wright book 4, Slow Burn, available for pre-order now – UBL. By way of promotion, again, we’ll have a short story – “The Handler” available to read free here on the website from the start of July (the 4th), then available as a standalone book and in print.
The Handler –
The mugging happens so fast that Marc barely has time to react.
For Marc and Sonia, a trip to Spokane means visiting family, a little shopping and some eating out. Not having someone accost them in the street.
When Cole Wright happens by, things might just take a different turn.
In other Cole Wright news, happily the work is complete on book 5, Scorpion Bait and it’s heading into preorder for September 20th. And, yes, there will be another short story free to read in the lead up from around the start of that month.
I’m having fun writing the Cole Wright short stories too, so will likely put out a collection of the five, plus a couple of extras in October or November. If I can ever figure out how to set up a mail list, I’ll be giving away another story for sign ups.
Hide Away, the third novel-length Cole Wright thriller is out now from the usual channels – find the link here.
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Cole Wright sits in a sparkling bright Route 66 themed diner in a small Montana town. Kind of town you could walk side to side in five minutes and leave behind.
In the mountains nearby, Joe Bridger consults his phone. Any moment and he will get the go ahead. A simple job.
He can get out of the snow and grab himself a meal.
The two should never meet. No need to.
Practically nothing in common.
Wright finds himself on a collision course. Suits him just fine.
We’ve struck a little copy-editing glitch with the intended next book. in the series – Scorpion Bait – originally due on July 20th, and that’s going to need another run through. So, to keep things moving, we’re moving up the release of Slow Burn from September to July. The books can be read in any order, so in theory, there’s little material difference. The new order appears on the Cole Wright Thrillers page. Preorder coming soon.
We’ll get Scorpion Bait wrestled into shape and have it out in September.
A beautiful piece of engineering, interstellar ship, Elegia Fortune should function perfectly. When the vessel falls out of warp, Lila Sansom and the crew find themselves with more problems than they can count.
Also coming in May, the third Cole Wright thriller, Hide Away, on May 20th, and available for preorder now, and the Cole Wright short story “The Forest Doesn’t Care”, available to read for free on this site from May 10th, through until the release of the novel.