It’s a quick announcement-y blog today, mainly because I’ve got a wedding in a few hours and I have Things to Do at it. But by happy coincidence a few things have actually happened in the last few days and thus I have things to talk about. Huzzah!

Firstly: anyone wanting to read good books should head over to indiebook.sale right now to check out the latest Narratess sale, in which you will find over 300 excellent bits of SF&F for little or no money. You have until Monday the 25th to fill your e-readers with as much as they can carry.

And if you wanted, say, to get started on my own Boiling Seas trilogy, then you’re in luck, because The Blackbird and the Ghost is free for the duration of the sale. Pleasingly, at the time of typing 102 people have grabbed a copy – join them, and provide me with the dopamine I need to continue writing weird stuff for years to come.

But on other fronts, I also have news – sort of news anyway, because I’ve only just heard it and I’m not sure if I’m meant to fully talk about it yet. I had two short stories rejected this week, which is disheartening, but fine; there are plenty of other markets in the sea and I’m well used to it by now. One of the stories had been held for a long time, so I’m a bit more annoyed about that – but equally it was a reprint so it’s not like it’s not already out there!

Yesterday, however, I got a doubly unexpected email. Firstly, it was a story acceptance – itself doubly unexpected news because I only heard about the call the day after it closed and submitted purely on the off-chance an editor was feeling generous. Which they seemingly were. Ta! Secondly, it was a story acceptance for an anthology which is apparently coming out in less than a month, because this press, it seems, works damn fast. Almost worryingly fast, honestly.

So that’s rather nice. It’s an anthology, which is a change for me – I’ve only had magazine publications for the last many years since Making Monsters, so it’ll be nice to be slotted in a themed collection. It’s also a royalty-share thingy rather than an advance, which is also a new arrangement for me but I figured it’d be worth a go, and I’ve heard good things from some previously featured authors… and ultimately what I want is for more people to read these nonsense words I keep writing down, and this is another way for that to happen. Add to that the other one or two upcoming stories that I’ll be shouting about as soon as I know when exactly they’re happening, and the end of this year is shaping up to be a good one for me. More credits on the increasingly unwieldy list, at least.

So that’s it, really: go get a free Blackbird, and a bunch of other books while you’re at it, and watch this space for short story stuff. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go and probably cry at my friends being in love.