announcements

Water Road Wednesday: The Endless Hills Cover Reveal & Release Date!

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

Has everybody had time to digest The Water Road? If not, better get cracking, since before you know it it’ll be time to grab hold of The Endless Hills, the second volume of The Water Road trilogy.

Just so you know what to look for, here’s the cover for The Endless Hills:

TEH Cover (540x810)

Once again, this cover is by Deranged Doctor Design.

When will you, dear readers, be able to get your hot little hands on The Endless Hills? It will be released in eBook form on August 31, with the paperback to follow a few days later.

Remember, The Water Road is now available at Amazon as well as in the real world at Empire Books & News.

Come See Me!

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

Last Monday I was down at Empire Books and News in Huntington, West Virginia, taking part in a cool monthly event called Writers Can Read.

EmpireLogo (Full)

It’s pretty simple – gather some writers together and have them read some from their work. Each month has a couple of featured writers, then a kind of open-mic section for anyone who wants to join in. After hearing from poets Ace Boggess and Neil Carpathios and a few other folks, I had a good time reading a scene from The Water Road.

I’ll be back at Empire this Saturday, July 30, for not one but two signing events! But I won’t be alone. From 11am to 1pm and then again from 6 to 8pm, I’ll be there along with several other local writers of the fantastical:

Brian Adams

Michele Zirkle Marcum

Royce Sears

Wayne Ferguson

Charles Romans

Dr. William Grimes (11am only)

Stewart Lucas (6pm only)

Michael Knost (6pm only)

The second signing session leads right into Empire’s event for the rollout of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child that will be available starting at midnight.

I’ll be there with copies of all three of my books, including The Water Road. Stop by, say hi, get a signed copy of a book (or three!). See you then!

West Virginia Writers Showcase

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment
Last year, Huntington-area author Eliot Parker organized the first annual West Virginia Writers Showcase at Tamarack in Beckley.

I was happy to be a part of it, hanging out for the day talking with people and doing a reading from one of the stories in The Last Ereph. I’m equally happy to say I’m going to be taking part in the event again this weekend.

Writers will be on hand at Tamarack both Friday and Saturday. I’ll be there on Saturday (from 10-5) with a box full of The Water Road and Moore Hollow (which you can also get directly from Tamarack). I even have a few copies of The Last Ereph left, if short stories are more your thing. No readings this time, unfortunately.

Stop by and see me and check out the other interesting local authors that will be there!

 

Water Road Wednesday: It’s Here!

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

After years of writing and what seems like years of doing these Water Road Wednesday posts, I’m beyond excited (“berry ready to pop,” to steal a phrase from Mike Keneally) to say that The Water Road, the first volume of The Water Road trilogy, is now available for your reading pleasure:

TWR Cover

The Water Road is available in both eBook and paperback form from Amazon. For the rest of June, the Kindle version is only 99 cents! It’s also available for free (essentially) as a part of Kindle Unlimited.

Enjoy and remember – volume two, The Endless Hills, is only a few months away. And check back next week for another Water Road Wednesday!

Water Road Wednesday: Leave a Message at the Beep

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

Thank you for calling Water Road Wednesday. We’re sorry, but your desire to learn more about the world of The Water Road trilogy cannot be fulfilled at this time. The author has been called away to the industrial north to attend a gathering of those who fight the good fight (none of which involve Neldathi, the Triumvirate, or anything like that).

PDComic

Regular service will return next week.

Until then, go tell the author’s niece (also a writer) happy birthday – she’s 21 today!

Or, if you need some companionship, just talk to the answering machine:

Water Road Wednesday: Cover & Release Date!

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

I’ve spilled quite a bit of virtual ink over the past weeks (this is the 20th edition of Water Road Wednesday, by the way) talking about the world of The Water Road, some of the things that happen there and, most importantly, some of the people who inhabit it. Now’s the time to put something a little more concrete with all that.

I’m very pleased to reveal the cover for The Water Road:

TWR Cover (540x810)

It’s by Deranged Doctor Design, who will be doing the covers for The Endless Hills and The Water Road, too.

With a cover I can also announce that The Water Road will be released on June 22 – that’s right, on Water Road Wednesday! It will be available as an eBook exclusively from Amazon. Paperback will follow shortly thereafter (it’s harder to coordinate that).

Of course, there will be more info on the entire Water Road Trilogy as the year rolls on!

Guest Post: Flutterby Girl by Suz Korb

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

A guest post from Suz Korb about her new project.

Hello, I’m Suz Korb and my new book project is titled: Flutterby Girl. Welcome to this cover reveal blog post, with a twist. And here’s the cover…

The twist is that this book hasn’t been written yet. I’m going to write it live on Patreon. I’ve written a novel live before, chapter by chapter, on my blog. And now I’m doing it again with Flutterby Girl!
I got the idea for Flutterby Girl, then I thought up a title, then I got the cover, and now I’m writing the story. It will go up on Patreon chapter by chapter, daily. You can read each chapter if you become my patron. I’m new at Patreon, so if problems arise I hope I can deal with them quick! It should be easy enough though.
I’ve decided to write my two most recent books live because it pushes me, and it makes my imagination flow more deeply.

Chapter 1 of Flutterby Girl is up on Patreon now and I hope you will join me in this young adult journey.

Author Suz Korb
Suz Korb Patreon
suzkorb.com
Twitter @SuzKorb
Facebook Author Page

I’m at Tamarack!

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I’m at Tamarack!

Opened in 1996, Tamarack (just outside of Beckley) is a showcase for West Virginia artists of various kinds. According to its website, it was the first of its kind – a center devoted to the promotion of regional arts. In the 20 years since its opening more than 7 million people have visited.

Items sold at Tamarack have been juried and approved, which means getting into the collection there is something of an accomplishment. So I’m very pleased to report that my first novel, Moore Hollow, is now available there:

Book@Tamarack1

Cell phone picture – pardon the quality

I think Moore Hollow is a natural fit for Tamarack, given that it’s set largely in West Virginia. It also ties a little bit into the political history of the state and, I hope, might give people a reason to rethink their perceptions of small mountain towns and the people who live there.

Of course, Moore Hollow is also still available from Amazon, as well.

What I’m Doing for the Next Month

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

Traffic here on the blog will be light-to-nonexistent for November while I participate – once again – in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo.

NaNo-2015-Participant-Banner

Except for 2010 (I was editing) and 2014 (I was getting ready to spend two weeks in Cambodia), I’ve done NaNoWriMo every year since 2008. I’ve “won” – that means I’ve produced at least 50,000 words from scratch – four years and failed two other times.

I’ve found NaNo to be a good time to really focus down on writing and force myself to be productive every day. Moore Hollow, which came out last month, was my NaNo project for 2012. Meanwhile, The Water Road and The Endless Hills were projects for 2009 and 2013, respectively. As you can see, it takes a lot of time beyond NaNo to polish something into a finished product, even if it’s a winner.

All of which is a long way of saying that for November, NaNo and The Bay of Sins (book three of the trilogy of which The Water Road and The Endless Hills are the first two parts) is my first priority. I can’t say I won’t blog about anything – in fact I know of one thing I’ll have to blog about – but pretty much anything else will have to wait until December.

You can keep track of my progress, if you like:

Alternately, I’ll be posting occasionally to Twitter, so you can follow me there.

See you in December!

Appearances, Both Virtual and In the Flesh

/ JD Byrne / Leave a comment

As we careen toward November and National Novel Writing Month, here are a couple of other places you can find me this week, on virtual, the other not so much.

First, head over to the Speculative Fiction Showcase and check out my interview with them. It’s a great site if you’re interested in fantasy, sci-fi, or the like (and if you’re not – why are you reading this, anyway?) and their questions were different and fun. Check it out.

Second, this Saturday – yes, that would be Halloween – I’ll be appearing, along with Eric Fritzius (author of the excellent collection A Consternation of Monsters) at Empire Books in Huntington, West Virginia. We’ll be there from 4-6 pm signing and selling books, and even doing some readings from our books. I’ll try and find a suitably spooky portion of Moore Hollow to match whatever creepiness Eric will come up with.

SigningPoster

See you soon!