Relocation

So apparently the WordPress scheduler failed me. I shall add them to my list and prep the voodoo dolls.

Anyhow, as you all know, last month was the grand finale of the Waking Den. But have no fear! I’ve simply relocated, not fallen into the black abyss from which there is no escape. You can find me at the shiny new http://galfordchris.com/! Because it’s about time this author had a proper website.

I’m still getting things situated exactly the way I like them, but if you’ve any comments, concerns, suggestions, I’m all ears. I hope you’ll follow me to the new site and continue with me through a whole bunch of new ventures.

Once more unto the breach!

The Den’s End

When you first met me, I looked like this.

After many years, I regret to say that the end of this month will mark the end of The Waking Den.

When I started it, eight years ago, I was still in college. I was working on my first novel. I had a lot of ideas and very few notions of how to achieve them (I’m not sure too much has changed on that count!). This blog provided an outlet that was immeasurable for its help and, at times, the community that came and went around it.

But it’s no secret this past year has been probably one of the hardest of my life. With three books now to my name and a host of other scribbles, I’ve grown a lot creatively (though  not met with any visible success), but life has borne down impossibly hard, and I simply do not have the time or energy to devote to this forum’s upkeep–not mention that after so many years and form changes, it’s become a touch bloated, to say the least!

For all that it has seen–short stories, articles, reviews, poems (god, so many Poems)–I will not be deleting it, but leaving it as a standing memorial. An archive of works that stand also to the progress of a young mind.

In time, I hope to return with a new project, with a website under my own name, but that will take time, and a great deal of change on the homefront to be able to achieve.

Today, I look like this. Time is a strange creature.

In the meantime, for those of you that have read, or said something, commented, participated, picked my brain, few though you may be, know that it has meant the world. To engage…that’s why we put ourselves out in the world, I think. We evolve through interaction, for it teaches us what we’ve done wrong, what we’re doing right, and new ways of doing things. New sights, new sounds, new people–the more we experience, the more we make ourselves accessible to art. Your connection has helped me grow as a person, and the bounty of that gift is incalculable.

Thank you.

And to all of you: keep writing.

Keep reading.

Don’t ever let your passion die.

Mental Health, Real Life and Feels Ahead

Deep breaths.

Sorry for the quiet, everybody.

On Turkeys, Great and Small

Alright everybody, just a heads up. There’s been a lot happening in the world; you know it, I know it, me posting about it here would just clog the Internet up with another voice shouting about senselessness into the void. Many have expressed my heart’s feelings on the matter better than I could, but if you really wanted to hear me screaming, go through the backlog of my Twitter. It’s filled with late night laments.

I know I write entertainment. It’s what most people turn to literature for. That said, the way the world’s been spiraling, well…it hasn’t been terribly conducive to that process. One of the burdens of being creative? Your heart gets pulled in a lot of different directions.

So, right, the heads-up. Basically, I wanted you all to know I’m taking the rest of the month off. Partly because I’m going to be spending the upcoming (American) holiday in Virginia, partly to finish up Christmas gifts for those close to me (you probably know who you are, and you’re going to be getting some stories), and partly because I’m trying to figure out next steps.

Next month marks the anniversary of the release of THE HOLLOW MARCH and that’s always a nostalgic and interesting time for me. A number of projects have also fallen through in recent days, and that winter depression is already clawing at my bones.

In other words? Drawing lines. Taking care of myself.

As I hope you all are doing. I’ll see you in December with plenty of new stuff. In the meantime, don’t hesitate to write. I see you, I hear you, and I have mad amounts of those heart-related feelings for you all.

Angry Turkeys for everyone!

A Bleak New World has Arrived!

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

~Robert Frost

Just in time for Halloween, A BLEAK NEW WORLD anthology has hit shelves–are you ready to take the road to dystopia with a few maladjusted (yet intrepid) authors like myself?

www.amazon.com/Bleak-New-World-Dystopian-Anthology-ebook/dp/B017C60E46/

Background for A BLEAK NEW WORLD

Can you feel it in the air? The changing of the scenery, the dying of the light, the taste of damp and snow…no, I’m not talking Autumn. Naturally, I’m talking about the release of the anthology A BLEAK NEW WORLD tomorrow! You haven’t forgotten, have you?

I was thrilled to be a part of this collection with my sci-fi short, “Clinging,” and I hope some of that comes across during an interview the rest of the writers and myself participated in as part of the anthology’s promotion today. Hosted on fellow writer Gregory Norris’s blog, the interview talks about the launch, how the project came together, as well as the inspirations and backstory to the individual writers’ pieces.

Here’s a preview:

Like the majority of the stories written during that marvelous spell — a western, a SF tale, several horror efforts — I later edited the draft of “Third World” for submission to publishers and sent it out the door. This particular tale went to the fine folks at Raven International Publishing, who were reading for a dystopian-themed anthology, A Bleak New World, where it was soon accepted. This week, the anthology debuts, offering dark glimpses into possible futures best avoided apart from visits to within the covers of this wonderful reading experience. Bleak is the brainchild of RIP head honcho Clark Chamberlain. As any familiar with Clark’s fiction writing work, daily podcasts, or his stellar The Book Editor Show, Bleak‘s subject matter is a fair departure for the publisher’s normally upbeat vibe. So why did he go the dystopian route for RIP’s first multi-author anthology?

“I choose to be upbeat and positive. I have slogged through a lot of life, death of children, divorce, crises of faith, and then there was Iraq,” says Clark, a former and still part-time soldier. “What I did there and what I was willing to do there really made me look at myself in a negative light. When I got home I was drifting, had thoughts about killing myself or at least going back to the war. Some of my persona is a mask to hide that darkness, or at least keep it down. I want peace so badly in this life because I’ve seen the darkness. I feel that we need to confront those emotions and feelings and really look hard at ourselves. Through story we have that opportunity. And on the business side, my then partner and I thought the sci-fi community would be a good place to dive in.”

Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World was the inspiration behind Bleak.

“I read that and thought this isn’t much of a dystopia,” Clark adds. “Being satisfied with your lot in life, that sounds pretty great. I’d much rather live there than 1984. So I wanted to see what others could come up with and I was pleasantly surprised.”

Read the rest of the interview, along with my own backstory, at Gregory’s blog, here.

And celebrate Halloween with a dark new anthology of fiction–the first by Raven International Publishing! Don’t miss out. You never know when that apocalypse might finally come around.

Fantasy Summer Sales and Indie Week Giveaways

Fantasy bandwagon: activate!

It’s one thing to have written three books.

It’s quite another to share them with the world.

Well, this week I’m aiming to do just that. In concert with the approaching American Independence Day (sorry Brits), I figured it’s only right to celebrate Independent Authors, too, so there’s going to be a FLASH SUMMER SALE running on THE HOLLOW MARCH all week long. From today through Friday, July 3, the first entry into my fantasy series–THE HAUNTED SHADOWS–will be available on the cheap. So if you know anyone looking for a new fantasy series to lose themselves in, that’s the bandwagon to jump on.

And by bandwagon, I mean gryphons.

And by jump on I mean get eaten by…

Er, you know what? The details really aren’t important, are they?

Contemporary fiction at its finest.

What’s more, I’d also like to take the time to incline your ever-so-thoughtful heads towards another Indie sale going on this week. Fellow author Bryce Salazar’s debut novel, SHE SEES METAPHORS will be available for the low, low price of free through tomorrow. Absolutely no cents involved. Plenty of nonsense, though.

Bad jokes? Hey, that’s just part of our appeal.

Seriously, though, Salazar is a brilliant writer, with a piece that will blow the pants off any character-intensive reader out there. It tells the tale of one Jacqueline Schuler, who sees the world in metaphors. Literally. From streets of violent rivers to broken hearted mannequins, it’s a unique outlook on the world, with some truly intense imagery. It’s not quite magical realism, but it’s certainly magical in its modernity.

So give it a read, why don’t you?

Wear that Millennial Stamp with Pride

I want you to stop and consider something for a moment. Our generation is in a truly unique position in the history of the world. We are the first to have not only grown up with the Internet, but grown up on the Internet. This is the critical difference between us and everyone gone before us.

Call us the Millennials. Call us the next Lost Generation. But there is something more to us.

Ok, screw that headline.

After all, it is they that come up with the terms: we surf the Net. We cruise the Web. We are lost in Virtual Space, careening through the system of Tubes that constitute what is, to them, nothing more than an overly addictive game.

But it is not a game. One plays a game. We don’t “play” the Internet. It is as critical and ever-present in our modern environment as the grass beneath our toes or the atmosphere that holds us to it. It is not external—it is connected. It is not alternate reality, but another layer of reality itself.

Which is to say, the Internet is not something we use. It’s something we live—on it, inside it, alongside it, frolicking with it down memory lane, what have you—but it is an inescapable facet of our existence. We use the Internet to keep in touch with those both near and far, to organize, to research, to prepare. We plan with it, chart calendars on it, study, and dream through the wondrous expanse of its pages. Friends and enemies rise and fall online. Love and hate flourishes and dies in its expanse. Some of the greatest debates (and the tackiest) in the history of mankind are no doubt, out there, in the expanse of the Internet…Online, eternal, waiting.

For us, the Internet has never been something we needed to “learn.” It is an evolution—another entity, sitting alongside us in the classroom, aging and lengthening before our eyes. It is continuous. In it, we grow, and through us, it grows. It is. It simply is.

What more need I say? The Net is a part of us. It’s not tacky sci-fi, not some Utopian paradise—it is, at its simplest, the collection of thoughts, ambitions, emotions, which embody Us. It is us. Let the history of mankind be writ large upon it.

And let the folks on it learn to start treating one another as equals. But hey, that’s just commonsense in facet of life, isn’t it?

…isn’t it?

Coming to a Patreon near you

It has been quite the ride we have had–which is not, I might add, a prelude to its ending. Merely the need for change.

I have been writing since I was four years old. The first book I ever wrote was a 10 page, colored monstrosity for my first grade class about the Winter King conquering a kingdom and celebrating by dancing madly atop a castle. This shows you two things: that I am undeniably from Michigan, as I knew that winter would win, and that I may have in fact known that winter was coming as long as George R.R. Martin. It was also my first taste of censorship, as my parents advised me it was better to have the Winter King out think the bad guys than to simply beat them up.

C’est la vie.

Since then, I have released three books–the Haunted Shadows series, NOT the adventures of the Winter King, mind you–but I am no closer to making writing my day job. What’s more, my actual day job works to actively undermine my creativity and there are nights I come home bled dry. Journalism and freelance editing fill the off hours, but they are more supplementary income than beating the creativity wolves back from the door. The world has changed, but in the entertainment industry? Not for the better. Times are hard, and despite everything I beat myself up over, tell myself not to do, I’ve decided to do something radical…

I’m turning to you readers out there for help.

Believe me, it’s not easy. I’ve talked myself up to it and down time and time again. I hate the notion of begging. Of being seen to be asking for a handout. Then I realized…

It’s a fear of being seen as weak, having to ask for help in a world obsessed with pronouncing those who haven’t found their footing yet D.O.A.

Today I am announcing my own Patreon. Patreon is a site that allows you to support artists in creating what they love, and what you love; call it a mini-Kickstarter, if you will. Therein, you can pledge for stories written, poems woven, videos crafted, to your heart’s content. You don’t have to pay perpetually, you can back out anytime, and you pay only what you think the creator deserves, or what you can afford to give for the creations you enjoy.

Personally? It brings me one step closer to actually making writing a career, and that…that’s the stuff of dreams. I want to keep writing. I never want to stop, nor let the world take that away from me. I hope you can help with that. No strings attached, no arms twisted, no hounds released–all I ask if that you check out my page, and if you like what you see, both there and here, donate, so you can help me to create more.

Thank you, gentle readers. You’re one of the many reasons artists create.

A Short Soap Box in Defense of Sci-Fi

Metropolis’ New Tower of Babel

There are people in the world who do not understand how anyone could love classic science fiction. That declare they have no relevance. I ask in turn: what’s not to love? Heaps of books shouting to the heavens: “WELCOME TO THE DISTANT YEAR TWO THOUSAND OT FIFTEEN; MAN HAS CHARTED THE UNIVERSE (PROBABLY SOMETHING TO DO WITH WHY THE UNIVERSE IS ALSO IN CHAOS), AND ALSO FLYING CARS.” Should damn well put a bloody tear in your eye to see the high hopes our forefathers once had for us.

As for relevance, well, maybe you have a point there…I mean, of course, you had classics like Metropolis that let us all know by the year 2000 we would be living in a highly stratified class system where the poor are brutally oppressed and worked to death as living machines. Thank God that didn’t happen, right?

…Right?