Jamie McFarlane's Blog

Earlier this summer my oldest sister, Diane, passed. She was the one who I played Dungeons and Dragons with when I was younger, she also introduced me to the path of publishing and writing. It’s safe to say, I wouldn’t be an indie publisher/writer if not for her. Enough time has passed that I’m much more grateful for her life than I’m saddened for her death.

Community is a word that’s been on my mind when reflecting about my sister. One of the tasks left to me and my other sister, Carol, was to publish Diane’s final novel in her Bellingwood series. I imagine there isn’t a ton of crossover between Diane’s cozy mystery readers and mine aside from family friends, so I won’t be surprised if this is new to you. What I discovered when we published the 48th novel in her long running series was a tremendous community. Dozens of people came out of the woodwork to help with the work, from proofreaders to fact checkers to just folks who wanted to say a nice word and help us along the way. It was a humbling process to be part of.

The experience set me to thinking about what it is I really enjoy writing about. Privateer Tales, Junkyard Pirate, and Boltguns and Duct Tape are so much more about a community of people working together to solve a problem than they are about any single individual. I’ve learned the industry term for this feature is ‘found crew.’ Better described as people show up as the story progresses and they end up sticking around because they’ve finally found a place to fit it.

That place to fit in is what I personally desire and also something I want to work for. My hope for you is that you too feel this sense of community when you read my stories. I’d love to facilitate a place for you feel like you’ve found ‘your people’. To that end, I invite you to join us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/junkyardinsider/! I’d love a chance to meet you, so drop in and say hey!

In other news, a lot of people have been asking about book #2 in Spaceship Mechanic series. I’m excited to share with you that the rough draft of Jump Drives and Coffee Stains is complete. The process from here looks like a lot of editing and proof reading. Generally, it’s a six-week haul to get from rough draft to release, but with holidays, we’re probably looking at February 1st. I’ll go faster if I can, but I wouldn’t hold your breath.

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The topic top of mind today is about taking risks and trying new things. As I’ve matured as a writer and publisher, I’ve found both joy and hardship in taking risks. To a rational mind, there’s symmetry in the idea of risks not always panning out. I accept this, but accepting doesn’t make the consequences less daunting. If you’ve been reading Jamie McFarlane works for very long, you know that I like to shake things up and try new storylines.

Here’s a question for you, do you remember On a Pale Ship? I loved writing this story, but I made a critical mistake in the beginning. Methodically, I told a story about each new crew member and showed their extraordinary abilities. One woman was essentially an acrobatic cat burgler, another man was large, very strong and had a big heart, another was a sharpshooter who rarely missed what he aimed at. The risk I took was that I killed each one in turn as I introduced them. Fine. You’re right. That’s a horrible start. The thing is, like in Princess Bride, they were only mostly dead, which meant they were partially alive. Most readers set the story down before they got to the good part.

As a writer/publisher who lives on the income of my creative works, having a dud is kind of painful. I write a story every three to four months. If I get it wrong, well, let’s hope I have some savings. Fortunately, in a previous career, I figured out how to put money aside for rainy days.

Now, here’s the great side of taking risks and trying new things. Occasionally, we get it right. Earlier this year, I found myself at a creative crossroads. I needed to start a new project, and I wanted to break new ground. I love the Junkyard Pirate series, but I’ve written a whole lot of military science fiction. The Oldest Starfighter did reasonably well, but it’s follow-on Rogue Commander struggled to make the grade.

As I was discussing this with Cindy, she really pinned me down, asking me what I wanted to do. The problem with this question is that within the answer, there’s an aspect of fear. Choose the wrong project and it’s a failure. For every creative ever, every stumble translates to I’m a failure. In the cold light of day, it’s easy to debunk that translation, but also, fear isn’t about logic. For a couple of weeks, we kept coming back to this question about what I wanted to do vs. what I thought I should do.

Finally, I realized, I wanted to write stories like I had with Privateer Tales. For me, this looks a lot like putting together an unlikely crew and put that crew up against unusual problems that they will struggle with. And from this, I hatched the idea of Rix Banner, a bright, hardworking mechanic from the 1950s being thrust into a highly advanced civilization. The big reveal is that Rix’s real superpower is common sense and a lack of fear in learning new things.

From all of this, Boltguns and Duct Tape emerged and I’ll tell you, I was sweating the release. Would my readers like it? Would I find new readers? I love that the answer to this is that Boltguns and Duct Tape was very well received and continues to attract old and new readers, alike. If you haven’t checked it out yet, please, give it a try. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

Speaking of risks, though. Something you might not know about me is that I really enjoy experimenting with food and drink. Cindy and I constantly challenge each other when we’re out to dinner to find the weirdest thing we can on the menu and give it a try. It’s not uncommon for this to work out poorly. Fortunately, things she finds to be untenable, I often enjoy and the reverse. It’s not uncommon for us to each buy a cocktail and then switch after the first drink. It’s a fun game and it’s really spiced up date nights.

At this point, you might be wondering why the feature artwork for this post is a spaceman, sitting in a bar, contemplating a green drink. This is where I chuckle. The green drink is one of our experiments. And I can say, without reservation, that it is the worst drink I have ever tasted in my life. So much so, that I finished the entire thing, just to embed the experience into my brain as deeply as possible. The drink is called Fisherman’s Folly. Are you feeling adventurous today? Here’s a link to the recipe: Fisherman’s Folly Cocktail

If you’re not inclined to check it out but are interested in what makes it so pungent, it starts by taking a spritzer filled with fish sauce and spraying each glass prior to pouring matcha tea, sake, pickle juice, grapefruit juice and gin from a shaker. And, of course, this is now Philo and Rix’s favorite drink. You should classify this as a dare, not a recommendation.

In other news, I am thrilled to report that I’m 90% complete with the newest Spaceship Mechanic novel, Jump Drives and Coffee Stains. With holidays and editing, it’s likely that we’re looking at a Feb 1st release. Also, for those interested in Drakon Prince, you’ll be interested to hear that I’ve reclaimed publishing rights from the original publisher. This means, I’m free to write the next story in that series. I fully plan to release not one new story in that line, but three more for a total of four. I don’t know when I’ll get all of that done, but it’s coming!

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I love the in-between time of the writing/publishing cycle. Publishing a book takes about 25% as much effort as writing. The work is administrative in nature and can make or break the success of a newly published work. It’s also not much fun. Maybe, at some point in the future, we’ll talk about these tasks, but not today. Today is about the in-between.

Writing is the best job in the world. I hear others complain about the work because some days, it is hard to sit down and be creative. I’ve had these days. Some days, bad reviews are thrust into our faces and for a moment, that can derail us. I’ve had these reviews. Some days, the words won’t flow and nothing you write seems even a bit useful and it’s deleted forever. I’ve written those words.

I’ve recently taken up golf. And by that, I mean, I’ve taken a couple of lessons and played six games over the last nine months. Writing and golf have lots of similarities. Golf can be frustrating. No matter what I do, the ball just doesn’t quite go where I want it to. And also, one out of a hundred shots (at least for me) strike true, the ball lifts effortlessly from the grass and sails straight, landing perfectly where I’ve aimed. It’s a great feeling.

So now you’re convinced I’m fully ADD. I’ve introduced four ideas without tying them together. Here’s why all this fits together for me. In the in-between time, I put in the work of writing, and when I write that section or chapter that really just does it for me, it’s a lot like hitting that perfect golf swing. It’s effortless and I wonder why I ever struggled. That effortless prose ties the ideas in my head to words in a way that I am so very grateful for because I know I have readers who will appreciate the effort. It is this experience in the in-between time that refills my buckets.

And now you’re wondering what is it about this girl I’ve met. Fiction is an exercise in tying imaginative ideas to shared or common experiences. Not so long ago, I did meet this girl, Cindy, and I have become quite fond of her. In the beginning, she was a friend, with whom I enjoyed sharing experiences. So much so that one night, while talking on the phone, I blurted out – so, I met this girl …

At first, her response was one of confusion as she wondered what exactly my point was, but Cindy is emotionally quite brilliant and trusted me enough to give me a little leeway in the conversation. Oh, do I know her? It was a good response, to which I responded with; I think so, but just let me tell you about her, I’ve been waiting all day to talk to you about this. I won’t go into the details of the conversation that followed, but I went on to describe to Cindy all the things I’d learned about her and why I had become so fond of her. And now, it’s kind of become my thing. In quiet moments, I’ll start – so, I met this girl. She has the best laugh when she hears this and asks me to tell her more.

In Jump Drives and Coffee Stains, the next in the Spaceship Mechanic series, you’ll see Rix having this same conversation with Kel, only will be about the girl he’s met. The girl won’t be Kel, but Kel is such a good friend that he just must share his excitement about meeting this new person.

Tying the themes of my own life to characters I’m writing about is immensely satisfying and only possible in the in-between times. I do love being a writer.

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Today, I woke up to fantastic news. Boltguns and Duct Tape was sitting at the top of two Amazon book categories with a shiny orange Best Seller flag. This is an achievement I don’t take for granted and also hope each new release will achieve. It is certainly not a sure thing. Even more, to get these two weeks after release is welcome social proof that the story is resonating well with readers. Yay!

The Spaceship Mechanic series is a shift in writing toward adventure and character progression, with less emphasis on military type action. Don’t misread that, though. I’ve enjoyed writing mil. science fiction and you’ll see more of it from me, it’s just fun to get back to something akin to Privateer Tales and then find that my readers have been waiting for these stories!

And now to the inside scoop. Boltguns and Duct Tape takes place about 70 years before the first Junkyard Pirate, but … there are several characters who show up in both series. I won’t list them all, because I don’t want to ruin any fun surprises, but I think it’s fair to mention that our favorite Beltigersk has a prominent place in both series. We also make it to Xandarj’s Dralli Station where we run into a very young character who you will also recognize by name if not by action. Running jokes like references to a favorite type of meal bar and the occasional spat with broken septic systems pop up from time to time. I love these easter eggs and get enough emails when you all find them that I find your joy of discovery extremely entertaining.

I’m about 65% through the rough draft of Jump Drives and Coffee Stains and am pushing hard to get this out to you as quickly as possible. If you haven’t had a chance to grab your copy of Boltguns and Duct Tape yet, now is a great time to do that. Reviews are always very welcome and just as much, I love it when you reach out by email or Facebook. We’ve built a wonderful community of science fiction adventurers and I appreciate being part of it.

Next time, we’ll dig into Philo’s new, favorite drink, complete with recipe, but, of course, that’s another story, entirely.

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Recently, I’ve taken some heat from a few, irritated souls who despise everything AI. It all started with the video trailer I created for Boltguns and Duct Tape using AI technology. Now please understand, semi-anonymous platforms like Facebook and Instagram allow people to write things in a way they’d never say to your face. The topic of flaming off on Facebook because there are few to no repurcussions is an interesting conversation by itself, but not really that interesting to this topic. The question I’ve wrestled with is when is it okay to use AI to generate content? Why is a video trailer different than a novel or even cover artwork? Likely the answer is, that it’s a question everyone has to wrestle with for themselves. For me, using AI to generate a novel, the cover artwork for my books, or even the narration for audiobooks is not acceptable. Creating video trailers? For me, that’s fully on the table. Why? I imagine that’s somewhere between the goal posts of; I love learning the skill of creating those videos and I can’t afford the production costs of creating fifty seconds of video.

So just what’s involved in producing the embedded video? It’s a lot more than I’d originally expected. First, AI video generation is both impressive, frustratingly inaccurate and extraordinarily limited. The art of figuring out how to piece together a comprehensive video which is comprised of dozens of elements into something that’s intriguing and digestible is maddening. I’ve given up on the process several times, but I keep coming back, because I want to see my ideas in these videos. And contrary to popular belief, it’s not free, although also not prohibitively expensive. In the creation of the Boltguns and Duct Tape video trailer, I generated 10 different videos and stitched them together. But before I could generate those videos, I used a combination of stock artwork, painted artwork from my illustrator Elias Stern, and an image generating AI. With the still images, I entered prompts talking about how I wanted the images to relate to each other in the video. I then used another AI to generate the voice tracks for the narration of the tiny story. Finally, I stitched it all together using Adobe’s Premiere Elements video tool. The fifty second video took me roughly fifteen hours to produce and when I was done, I wanted to spend even more time fine tuning.

What I ended up with makes me happy artistically. Oddly, my favorite part of the video is where Kel expresses her frustration that everyone on Earth knew that Rix’s advertisement that said he could fix spaceships was just a joke. In the end, that I’m having a good time working with the AI tools and that I’m creating something interesting is all the justification I need. Does that mean I’d entertain writing novels with AI? Not even for a minute. Writing is creative joy for me. I get caught up in the character’s lives and am transported to new worlds while I write. Why would I ever give that up?

Check out the video here:

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Fifty years ago, humanity faced its first big test against an invading alien species. Simply put, the war didn’t go so well. With more than eighty-five percent of our population wiped out in the space of a few months, we were on the brink of extinction. In the eleventh hour, luck and a brilliant crew of privateers put an end to the ravenous bug species known simply as Kroerak.

Time has passed and humanity is starting to claw its way back but the civilized worlds have changed. Warlords, petty thugs and all manner of criminals have crawled out from beneath the rocks under which they’ve hidden. More than ever before, humanity needs heroes who will stand up and push back.

With destiny foisted upon them from birth, Quinn and Olivia Hoffen have always lived in the shadows of their larger than life parents. And when the mystically sensitive Olivia is drawn to a mysterious, unstable wormhole, she drags both her best friend and brother back home to human settled systems her parents saved over five decades ago. With unexpected talents and a legacy of courage, Quinn and Olivia will once again step forward answer the call.

Brigand’s Choice, the first book in The Afterwar Saga is available February 1st, 2023. Hostile Legacy and Forsaken Colony will follow in rapid succession in April and June.

Check out this series on Amazon – click here

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Jamie McFarlane’s new series – The Afterwar Saga

Chasing his twin sister through an unstable wormhole connects Quinn Hoffen with long-lost family struggling to overcome unscrupulous brigands…

You read that right. Our hero’s last name is Hoffen. Quinn and his sister Liv are the twin children of Liam and Tabby. The Afterwar Saga picks up twenty years after the end of Privateer Tales and the war that’s referenced is of course, the Kroerak war. For me, the story (with help of an unstable wormhole) is a fresh start with characters who feel familiar but have a whole new set of challenges their parents were never faced with. I love being back in the Privateer Tales universe, even as I search through its nooks and crannies for dark villains to pit against our inexperienced crew.

On February 1st, I’ll release Brigand’s Choice: A Privateer’s Legacy (Afterwar Saga Book #1). That’s great, you say, but maybe you’re still thinking about the longer than usual wait. Those are good instincts on your part and in fact, there’s more. On April 1st, I’ll release Hostile Legacy (Afterwar Saga Book #2) and then on June 1st, I’ll release Forsaken Colony (Afterwar Saga Book #3). That’s right, starting in February, I’ll release a new installment every two months. That’s darn near a year’s work for me.

As of this writing, I’ve completed Bandit’s Choice, have delivered to beta Hostile Legacy, and have written six chapters of Forsaken Colony. The deadlines are achievable but I won’t be sitting on my hands anytime soon. I look forward seeing how you’ll receive this stand-alone yet follow on series.

In other writing news, I’ve identified that the project following Forsaken Colony will be Junkyard Commandos in the Junkyard Pirate series. I don’t have much beyond a title and an expectation for an epic battle, far from home. I’ll get back to the ground-pounding excitement of high-tech combat with grumpy old vets who understand the meaning of the words, honor and sacrifice.

Floating around in my head but with no firm dates or even plans to actively engage are the projects The Oldest Starfighter, Wizard Prince and completely new idea about an alien invasion that hasn’t gone so well here on Earth. I’ll release a short story on the latter as a test balloon to see what you all think. All of these are skunk works projects and I can’t be held to any dates on them, even though Wizard Prince is 85% complete, and The Oldest Starfighter is 30% complete.

So that’s it — Happy Reading!!

Jamie McFarlane

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First discovered in Blockade Runner, the Mhina system is in the western Aeratroas region of the Dwingeloo galaxy. In Blockade Runner, our crew first found the debris field of an ancient Felio fleet that was destroyed by the Kroerak invasion. In Blockade Runner, the Mhina-Tamu wormhole was blockaded by the Confederation of Planets in hopes of preventing further Kroerak incursions.

Elea Station is the home of House of the Bold.

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Located in the Dwingeloo galaxy, the Tamu solar system is the location of the massive blockade first discovered in Blockade Runner. The central and sole planet in Tamu is Abasi Prime, which is home and birthplace to the Felio people. With a population of roughly a billion, the Felio are organized into houses, typically with matriarchal rule. That there are three wormhole exits to other solar systems brings significant trade to the Tamu system.

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Hey, you’re invited!

On Wednesday, February 9th, at 3pm EST, Fantasy/SciFi Focus will be hosting a live Q&A on Facebook with yours truly as the guest of honor. If you’d like to join in, click on the picture or button below.

Also, I’ve created a new public group on Facebook called Inside The Junkyard. Everyone is welcome and the general theme is a discussion of Junkyard Pirate, Privateer Tales and other series or books I’ve written. If you’re on Facebook, please join in on the fun! Click here to check that out.

In other news, the long awaited Privateer Tales Book #20, Privateer’s Supremacy is finally through the rough draft stage and on to editing. If you recall, in Black Cutlass #19, the crew barely scraped by and defeated the mechanical, biological hybrids call Mendari. 

Privateer’s Supremacy picks up with our crew a little more than a year later. An uneasy peace is shattered when House Kifeda invades the Mhina system and attacks without warning and with little provocation. Things turn from bad to worse when our crew discovers that House Kifeda has reconstructed the blockade at the Tamu-Mhina wormhole, which is the only link from Mhina system to the rest of Confederation of Planets space. This 20th Privateer Tale is full of action and lots of new revelations that you won’t want to miss.

So, I haven’t really worked on the marketing text for this book with any dilligence yet. I’ll need to smooth out that introduction considerably before we head to market but that’s my best shot at it today.

The release date for Privateer’s Supremacy is March 24th. I’ll have a pre-order available on Amazon soon.

Also, I’d thought I might release Wizard Prince in February. I didn’t get there. I’m not sure what was in my mind with the holidays, but there was no way I was going to finish. I think we’re looking at early May.

As always, feel free to write. I respond to all emails as quickly as I can. Also join us on Facebook!

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