Nothing major to report this week. Things are still moving forward on the hardback release of Metrognomes: The Shaman's Apprentice, as well as two other hardback release. The first of these is the long postponed collected edition of The Chronicles of Nightfire, Texas #1-3 in the form of a novella entitled The Vampire Murders. The second is a collection of my haiku poetry, including some new ones, for which I have just recently engaged an illustrator whose energy very much fits with the spirit of the book.

The Metrognomes re-issue ran into a snag last week in formatting. Who knew it would be so hard to prevent changes from being made? The goal is to not make this edition any different, page layout-wise, from the paperback and eBook releases of 2007. The problem is in keeping the headers from altering, but progress is being made, tediously. The hard part, as I anticipate it, will be the legal end of true self publication and getting the book available through the same distribution channels as the previous releases. I am still hopeful that this book will see release before the end of the year, as well the other two mentioned above.

I have also re-examined the prospect of releasing my latest short story, which is a tale of horror called "The Christmas Spirit." I may alter the title a bit, and add a rather large scene at the beginning, maybe a little at the end...but I think I may let the world have it after all. I was recently researching the line from the song "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year" in which it is stated "there'll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glories of Christmases long, long ago." As it turns out, there is an old Victorian era tradition that involves the telling of "scary ghost stories" on Christmas Eve. I was thrilled at this discovery! I felt validated. This is simply something, at least here in America, that has been lost. I'd like to try and breathe new life into the "Christmas Eve Ghost Story" genre. I've found a book of old Christmas ghost stories that I intend to order. I'm fascinated by this idea. What a mad, fun addition to the holiday!

More as things develop!