It’s publication day for my fantasy short story collection, AT THE GATES AND OTHER STORIES.
I didn’t set out to be a short story writer. I always thought I would write novels (and I do, of course), but there is something irresistible in the perfection of a whole story contained in a short, well-crafted package. It’s the glint of sunlight that hints at an ocean, a single flower instead of a whole garden.
Most of my short stories were written in a ten year period between 2001 and 2011, although I’ve continued to write the occasional short story since, and this collection includes one story, Slipper of Glass, that was written in 2020 and has never been published anywhere else.
I’ve been really lucky with my stories. They’ve been published in a whole range of professional magazines and anthologies, from Interzone and Strange Horizons to Realms of Fantasy and The Year’s Best Fantasy, but this is the first time that I’ve gathered what I think are the sixteen best in a single volume.
I love these stories, and I hope you will, too. You can buy the collection as an ebook pretty much anywhere that sells ebooks, and you can buy a paperback version via Amazon.
This collection contains sixteen stories, with about 70,000 words of fiction. I hope there will be some stories in there that you love as much as I do.
I never wanted to have to delay my books. As a reader, I hate it when a book I’ve been looking forwards to gets delayed.
But then this is this year. I’ve now been hit by Covid for the second time. The first time, in April, was pretty bad and I ended up losing a couple of month’s work from it, and everything since then has been much slowed down. Now I’ve got it again, and it’s hitting me hard again. I know recovery is going to be slow.
Last time, I pushed through and got SHADOW OF A DEAD GOD out on time, despite the Covid, but it wasn’t a good idea. This time, I need to take it more easily.
So. My short story collection, AT THE GATES AND OTHER STORIES, which was scheduled to come out on December 3rd, 2020, will now be coming out on January 2nd, 2021. I’m really sorry to those who’ve pre-ordered it and will now have to wait longer. But I want it to be right, not a rushed job.
The sequel to SHADOW OF A DEAD GOD, NECTAR FOR THE GOD, was pencilled in for May 2021, and if I suddenly hit full health again tomorrow, that would still be happening, despite the illnesses, but I know from experience that that won’t happen. It is going to take me months to get back to health. So, NECTAR FOR THE GOD will now be coming out in the second half of 2021. I can’t say exactly when, because I don’t know exactly how long it’ll take me to recover.
I really hate having to do this, but I hope everyone will understand, and the books will appear eventually.
