Steampunk Thursday: Vanishing Point

German fans of Steampunk - or Fluchtpunkt - can now enjoy a free taster of my Pax Britannia stories courtesy of Luzifer-Verlag.

Click this link to download your free copy of my Pax Britannia novella Vanishing Point now!

JG and Pax Britannia on SFX.co.uk

If you check out the front page of SFX.co.uk right now (as in Sunday night) you'll see that top of the latest articles list (above one about detestable Doctor Who companion Melanie Bush) is an interview with me about The Ulysses Short Story Collection.

Dave Bradley (editor of SFX magazine) conducted the interview with me earlier this week via email and you can read the results here. I don't only talk about writing short stories during the course of the interview; there's also stuff about steampunk, novel writing and eBooks.

I'm very proud of the three stories in the collection - Fruiting Bodies, Vanishing Point and White Rabbit - which were all especially selected by myself, and it would appear that other people are discovering they like them as much as I do. And for 69p you can't really go wrong, can you?

The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol.1) - a new review

Reviewer Nathan Brazil has contacted me to let me know that he's posted a (very detailed) review of The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol. 1).

He has very positive things to say about Unnatural History and Human Nature but clearly loved Leviathan Rising.

Here are a couple of my favourite bits from the review:

On Unnatural History: "Throughout this work the author amuses with alternate tech, such as Ulysses Quicksilver's personal communicator; a brass and leather mobile phone, an Overground train network in Londinium Maximus, mechanical bobbies, and Beefeater-drones with clockwork craniums."

On Leviathan Rising: "...the real star here is the story behind the man-made Kraken. This has been well thought out, and has a terrific pay off. Leviathan Rising was, for me, streets ahead of its predecessor in terms of storytelling, and was just about perfectly paced."

On Human Nature: "From this point the story rattles along like a British Rail train with imminent brake failure, incorporating a desperate industrialist trying to escape the prison of his disease-riddled body, and a mad German vivisectionist. Some of what is portrayed is on the vomit-inducing side of gruesome, but definitely serves to keep attention glued to the page."

And on Vanishing Point (the novella that appears at the back of Leviathan Rising): "The best of these is... "Vanishing Point" which shows what the author is capable of when he allows himself to write more tightly, and with a sharper clarity of focus."

You can read the whole thing for yourself here, or here.

Nathan's soon going to be reviewing the rest of the Pax Britannia books, from Evolution Expects onwards and I can't wait to see what he makes of those...

The Ulysses Quicksilver Short Story Collection - available now!

All you eBook readers out there might like to know that The Ulysses Quicksilver Short Story Collection is available to download now for your Kindle. Here's the blurb from the back:

Dandy, detective and adventurer Ulysses Quicksilver tackles the enemies of the crown in this thrilling collection of three complete short stories drawn from the steampunk Pax Britannia Ulysses Quicksilver novels.

In 'Fruiting Bodies' a gruesome death leads Ulysses and his manservant Nimrod to the glasshouses of Kew, bringing them face to face with the horrors lurking within. A Hallowe'en séance leads our intrepid duo into a close encounter with the world beyond in 'Vanishing Point', whilst in 'White Rabbit' Ulysses journeys into a world of madness and murder, meeting some sinisterly familiar characters along the way.

This collection is the perfect starting point for readers new to the exciting world of Pax Britannia! 'Fruiting Bodies' was first published in the novel 'El Sombra', 'Vanishing Point' was first published in the novel 'Leviathan Rising' and 'White Rabbit' was first published in the novel 'Blood Royal'.

I'm very excited about the release of this Kindle-only collection and am looking into releasing some more of my work via Kindle in the not-too-distant future. My only problem now is that I need to buy myself a Kindle to see how the book's turned out in digital format.

And just in case you need persuading that you really should get hold of The Ulysses Quicksilver Short Story Collection for yourself, watch the following video:

The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol.1)

The postman struggled to deliver this today...

Opening up the (it has to be said) huge box I was delighted to discover the following lurking inside...

Yes, The Ulysses Quicksilver Omnibus (Vol.1) is here! Weighing in at over half a kilogram and 734 pages it is a hefty tome indeed and the ideal way of catching up with all things steampunk and Pax Britannian if you're new to the series or a late-comer.

Contained within a brand spanking new cover by Simon 'Pye' Parr are the first three Ulysses Quicksilver novels - Unnatural History, Leviathan Rising and Human Nature - as well as two Pax Britannia novellas - Vanishing Point and Christmas Past. And on top of all that, there's also a brand new introduction to the series and the character of Ulysses Quicksilver written by yours truly.

Featuring a wonderful new design for the series by Pye as well, it's available for an astonishingly reasonable £9.99 from Abaddon Books and even features a rather wonderful quote from SFX magazine on the back. You can pick up your copy here.

A little light reading for Halloween

Not busy tonight? Then lock yourself away from the ghost and ghouls that will undoubtedly be prowling the streets, snuggled down in your favourite leather armchair beside the fire and indulge in a little light Halloween reading.

But what to read? Well, you do a lot worse than the Pax Britannia ghost story Vanishing Point which appears in the back of Leviathan Rising, available now from Abaddon Books.

Cometh the Conqueror Worm

So, I made a start on Conqueror Worm today, the exclusive novella that will accompany my fourth Pax Britannia novel, Evolution Expects. It’s a little different from the other stories that have appeared in the back of the PB novels to date (Fruiting Bodies in Al Ewing’s wonderful El Sombra, Vanishing Point in Leviathan Rising and Christmas Past in Human Nature), so here’s something to give you some small idea of what it’s about.

John Lambton went a-fishing once, a-fishing in the Wear,
He caught a fish upon his hook he thought looked mighty queer,
Now what the kind of fish it was John Lambton couldn't tell,
But he didn't like the look of it, so he threw it down a well.

Now the worm got fat and growed, and growed an awful size,
With great big teeth and a great big mouth and great big goggle eyes,
And when at night it crawled about all looking for some booze,
If it fell dry upon the road, it milked a dozen cows.

This fearful worm would often feed on cows and lamb and sheep,
And swallow little babes alive when they lay down to sleep,
So John set out and got the beast and cut it into halves,
And that soon stopped it eating babes and sheep and lambs and calves.

So now you know how all the folks on both sides of the Wear,
Lost lots of sheep and lots of sleep and lived in mortal fear,
So drink the health of brave Sir John, who kept the babes from harm,
Saved cows and calves by making halves of that famous Lambton Worm!

(Traditional)