Thanks for stopping by.
I’m Brian. I write, and get after as many other fascinations as I can haphazardly manage.
Some favorite words to live by:
“Draw the art you want to see, start the business you want to run, play the music you want to hear, write the books you want to read, build the products you want to use — do the work you want to see done.”
— Austin Kleon, Steal Like an Artist
Black Hole Sundown, Coming This Spring •
Black Hole Sundown, Coming This Spring •
It’s been a long time in hibernation. It was in the can three years ago, and contracted for in April 2022. That’s just the way timelines tend to unfold at Cemetery Dance Publications. Eventually, though, the books emerge as beauties.
I’m happy to report that Black Hole Sundown has roused from slumber, and has gone slouching into 2025 to be born.
Yeah, what’s this one again? Black Hole Sundown is my sixth full-length collection … and full-length it truly is, at a chunky 600 pages.
Update: Happily, a week into 2025, CD has officially announced the book for a spring release, and it’s already at the printer.
Catapult yourself to the pre-order page, and you shall have my gratitude until the heat death of the universe.
Yeah, about The Immaculate Void and Skidding Into Oblivion…
Ever since their ill-fated releases, I’ve regarded The Immaculate Void and Skidding Into Oblivion as companion volumes. They began as a single story collection, but after the Void narrative morphed into an accidental novel, it made more sense to split them into separate books.
They hadn’t been out terribly long when the publisher, who had for years enjoyed an excellent reputation, was outed for several financial and ethical transgressions. After I exercised an option for a return of rights, both titles subsequently disappeared from the market.
In print, anyway. Months later I was alerted to the existence of audiobook editions of both, about which the publisher had never informed me. None of this is in any way a reflection on the audiobooks’ producer, who 100% acted in good faith, and has every right to issue them and keep them available.
Given the critical and reader reactions to both books, I’d hoped they could soon find new homes. But, according to my agent, there’s no love in the industry for books like these: out for a relatively short time, then yanked from the market to rescue them from what turned into unsavory circumstances.
My current plan is to reissue them sometime in 2024, as self-published editions, along with several other works that did their own disappearing acts, under more benign circumstances. (See this post for why plans got bumped back from 2023.)
All well and good, but a gratifying number of folks have steadily been reaching out because they would like to read these books now. I’ve done my best to accommodate everyone and keep you happy, and will continue to do so for now, because I truly appreciate the continued word-of-mouth interest.
And if that’s why you’re here, then have a go at this button like you really mean it.
Latest news. Questionable views.
The works. So far.
Lately I’ve started to feel as though I’m channeling some sort of inner George R.R. Martin. That might have once been a good thing. Now, though? Just the opposite.