A Spanish Interlude
Hello, and welcome to the new subscribers.
This one’s even more disjointed than usual, I’m afraid. Between the Spanish Interlude and the absence of any major deadlines, I’m busy with lots of tiny things. Design documents and pitches and commenting and brainstorming, all work without much word count.
I was a guest at Shadowcon in Barcelona last week, along with regular co-conspirators Ken, Robin and Cat. This was an absurdly good time, as we had a few days to hang out before and after the con. My thanks to the Shadowlands crew for their staggering generosity, and all the wonderful Spanish GUMSHOE fans.
While at the con, I ran two raucous sessions of my in-development Halfling English Murder Mastery GUMSHOE game which went very well, although some names like Tarragon Blimpfancy or Herringbone Norwich were a bit of mouthful.
I also popped into the fabulous Gilgamesh bookstore to sign an bunch of stock (and finally grabbed a Spanish copy of The Shadow Saint). They’re doing a version of The Broken God with an exclusive badge, by the way: https://gigamesh.com/libro/el-dios-caido/
Gigamesh is part of the ‘freaky triangle’, a district in Barcelona where there are 20+ geek-related shops within a short distance. It’s a bizarre experience to walk to down the street going “oh, look, a massive extremely well stocked game shop next to… another massively extremely well stocked game shop, next to, yes, another massively extremely well stocked game shop. And then it’s a Japanese coffee shop, and a cosplay place.”
Well worth a visit.
My next convention is going to be GenCon, although I’ll be flying back early to go to Worldcon. August may kill me.
While in Barcelona, our dog Salome had to be put to sleep. It was by no means unexpected - well, the exact timing was a surprise, but she was a very old Spaniel and we knew she didn’t have long. We had her since she was a puppy. It’s interesting how the absence manifests in different ways. With deceased people, I miss conversations I’ll never get to have, wish I could get their thoughts on a particular topic. (I really, really wish my mother was around to meet my kids). It’s all the what-might-have-beens.
With dogs, it’s all about the routine. The thousand tiny mental abrasions as you course-correct. I dropped a little piece of chicken on the floor earlier, and in that moment of “no need to pick that up Salome will grab it oh no she won’t” is a different sort of grief.
The Ocean Game campaign for the Fear Itself rpg is available for pre-order. This is an odd one, both in terms of content and genesis. The elevator pitch is "Clive Barker's Squid Game" - you're playing a mostly ordinary person dragged into a bizarre tournament between extra dimensional horrors, and that's the starting point.
The first files for this project date back to 2011 or earlier, when Dave Allsop and Adrian Bott were working on the infamous Book of Unremitting Horror. So much time had passed that we decided the best thing to do was treat the notes as basically a cryptic transmission, a text to be interpreted; it's less of a collaboration and more a sort of whisper relay.
It's strange and jagged and I'm not sure what to make of it, and I wrote most of the thing.
The next big thing, of course, is the release of The Sword Unbound. Inkstone Books are doing another signed-and-numbered hardcover edition, which you can pick up at https://inkstonebooks.com/product/the-sword-unbound/
I’ll also be doing a signing here in Cork, in Waterstones, on May 11th at 3pm.
A box of author's copies of The Sword Unbound showed up, and I unboxed it.
Now, because authors also have to be carnival barkers these days - if you post about any of my books in the next week, let me know (mytholder@gmail.com), and I'll put you in a draw for a signed copy of Sword Unbound.
Actually, let's encourage real-world interactions. If you tell a friend, or mention one of my books in passing, or stand on a mountaintop and shout, that works too.
Similarly, if any reviewers/bloggers would like a copy, let me know and I’ll sort something out.
Currently watching: I blasted through Fallout at high speed, and really enjoyed it. We’ve just subscribed to Paramount+ (one of the twins is really obsessed with the Ark: Survival Evolved game and wants to watch the new cartoon), so if there’s anything on there worth watching, please recommend.
Currently reading: A lot of ARCs, interspersed with non-fiction. I got Terry Pratchett’s biography (A LIFE WITH FOOTNOTES) in Gigamesh, and read it sitting in the Spanish sun which was lovely (although I may have alarmed some tourists by shouting ‘TEN POUNDS A WORD!?!’ at one point). Also reading Alistair Horne’s SEVEN AGES OF PARIS. I’m finding great value in histories (David Mitchell’s UNRULY was similar) that follow one particular narrow thread through time, as opposed to presenting a broader but much shorter slice. There’s a sensation of pulling up the zipper of time tight when you reencounter some hitherto disconnected historical fact you vaguely recall.
Thank you for reading. Hug your pets/children/history books/preorders, as appropriate.
—Gar