New Free Short Story to Newsletter Subscribers

Posted by Gary W. Olson on May 6, 2012

Just to remind the locals following this blog, I’ll be doing my first ever public reading from Brutal Light at Nicola’s Books in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on Monday 5/7 at 7 p.m (tomorrow). Also there doing readings that night will be Jim C. Hines, author of the popular Princess Novels fantasy series from DAW Books, Bethany Grenier, author of Sings with Stars, and Emmy Jackson, author of Empty Cradle: The Untimely Death of Corey Sanderson. Come on out and enjoy the multiple readings, signings, and lively discussion from four Michigan authors!

In other news, ever since I started up this newsletter, my horror short story The Body in Motion has been the free gift for subscribing. It’s about time it gets swapped out for something else… and that something is a dark fantasy story called Never Seen by Waking Eyes. In it, a woman with a connection to a strange power source is kidnapped, held hostage to obtain a certain rare book, and Nick Havelock must rescue her. Or must he?

If that sounds rather familiar, it should. Never Seen by Waking Eyes was a story I wrote about 8-9 years ago for an anthology that never saw publication, and became the seed for my dark fantasy novel Brutal Light. It was kind of fun for me to revisit the story and see what parts made it into the novel more-or-less intact (aside from being rewritten from first person to third), and what parts turned out to be very different. Hopefully you’ll enjoy it as well. Of course, the only way that’ll happen is if you subscribe (or if you’re already a subscriber)…

***Gary W. Olson is the author of the dark fantasy novel Brutal Light and several previously published and forthcoming short stories. He can be found via his website, his blog A Taste of Strange, as @gwox on Twitter, and in many other far-flung places on the Internet.

Brutal Light pre-release trailer 2.0, Free Short Story, and Food for Thought

Posted by Gary W. Olson on October 11, 2011

Here’s what I’m calling the ‘2.0’ version of the ‘pre-release’ of my book trailer for Brutal Light. ‘Pre-release’ because it contains an enticement for signing up for my e-mail newsletter that expires on 12/1; ‘2.0’ because I’ve incorporated Dawne Dominique‘s great cover art.

(Edit 12/1/2011 — I’ve replaced this with the ‘final’ trailer version, which no longer contains the newsletter enticement.)

The ‘enticement’ is that I will be drawing from the list of those signed up for the newsletter by 12/1 for the following: 1 person will win a signed trade paperback copy of my book Brutal Light, plus an electronic copy in PDF format. 2 second place finishers will get electronic copies in PDF format.

Additionally, anyone who subscribes to the newsletter will get a download link for a PDF copy of The Body in Motion, one of my early ‘science fiction horror’ short stories (revised and hopefully improved). I do caution in the link that it is violent and bloody, and contains mature subject matter (though not presented in excessively graphic form). The only thing I really remember about its genesis was that it was written in the weird, fiery state I was in for maybe a day after reading Harlan Ellison’s Deathbird Stories for the first time, and that the first draft was done in a day, which virtually never happens with me.

And if you don’t like it… hey, that’s okay. Just stay subscribed, as I’ll be making other stories (and other kinds of stories) the ‘free’ enticement in its place as the months and years roll on.

One other note, on another topic: I’ve made it so you no longer need to be registered to this website in order to comment on blog entries. Just enter your name (real or pseudonymous) in the top bar (and the bar below it), then your comment, then the CAPTCHA. At this point, I’d rather make it easier for the casual visitor to drop in and say something, and just take the increased risk of being spammed.

One still another note: while browsing through the site of Bryan Thomas Schmidt, whom I befriended (in the old, pre-Facebook sense of the term) at ConClave, I found the second half of a dialogue between him and another author (Anthony Cardno, whom I have not yet met) that resonated with me. I’ll link to the first half of the dialogue, on Anthony’s site. I encourage everyone reading this to go there, think on what they are saying and how it reflects on your own life and conduct… it’s certainly given me much to reflect on as far as my own is concerned.

Two Writers in Dialogue: A Conservative Evangelical and a Gay Liberal