I never thought that working in a quiet bookshop could be so potentially hazardous. Now, it's not the bookshop itself that is a problem nor the books. It is more its placement in the shopping centre. Right outside the shop - in the centre of a thoroughfare - is a kiosk Watch Shop. On Saturday, while I was working in the shop, two guys attempted to rob the watch shop.

It was right on 4.00 o'clock. The girl who works there was just finishing up counting the till take and putting it in the safe. The bookshop is open another hour, but it is the quietest hour, so I was just sitting at the front desk watching the world go by when the Watch Shop got one last customer. He needed to buy a watch for his girlfriend, it was urgent, and he knows she's closing but if he could just get a watch before she goes home that would be great. He's leaning over a glass case filled with watches, pointing to the one he wants. To prove his potential purchase he pulls out a wad of money and flashes it around.

And that's when I really start to take notice.

You see, his wad of cash has hundred dollar notes, and fifties too. No one flashes around hundred dollar notes! You just don't do things like that.

The girl goes over to this guy. She sees the money and one last sale. He's pointing at the watch he wants and she goes to open the case.

That's when I notice the second guy. He's on the other side of the kiosk. He's stepping over the 'door' in the side of the kiosk and heading towards the cash register. She can't see any of this happening behind her back.

I rush out from behind the front desk of the bookshop and shout, "Hey! What are you doing!?"

The guy inside the kiosk reaching for the register is startled. The girl working in the kiosk is startled. Anyone within 200 yards of the shop is damn well startled!

The girl is also just realising (and so am I) that she now has someone on the 'inside' with her. I have horrible thoughts of him grabbing her, and I guess so does she. So, I move out of the bookshop, towards the kiosk, shouting and gesturing, swearing and screaming.

People are really starting to stop and look now and the guy in the kiosk backs out. His mate - the foil who acted as distraction - takes off. I expect Mr.Reach-for-the-Till to do the same. But he doesn't!

Instead, he comes at me. He's shouting and screaming at me! "Who the fuck are you? What the fuck are you doing? Why don't you fuck off?! I'm gonna fucking stab you prick!" And he pushes me in the chest with one hand. He's not reaching for any weapon, just shouting and trying to stand-over me. I look around and he does too. He notices all the people. I don't give any ground, I just stand there, waiting. And then he runs.

He was gone in an instant and nobody made a move to stop him. I even had to shout at someone in another store to call security! And then they took another 5 minutes to arrive.

The police? We rang straight away and they said they'd send someone straight over. This was at 4.15pm on Saturday. We waited around until 6.30pm. They did not turn up. Sunday morning, the police were called again. Oh yes, they went out and there was no one there at the shopping centre. What time? 8.00pm!

So, the cops finally arrive around 3pm on Sunday to take statements, get the centre security footage etc. And one cop says, "You know, if you had of called us straight away we could have been out looking for these guys yesterday afternoon".

Well, fuck me, Sherlock! What an excellent idea.

The state of my office has reached critical mass and I can no longer work amongst the chaos of books, magazines, games, bills, statements, invoices, receipts, half-written stories, aborted research, role playing games, cds, pens, pencils, paints, paperclips, coding manuals, Futurama bobble-heads, hats and caps, SD cards, business cards, playing cards, birthday cards and Christmas cards, screwdrivers, spanners, screws and cords, cables, cords, cables, cords, cables... arrrghh!!

Today is clean-up day.

Because amandapillar tagged me!

"List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your spring winter. Post these instructions in your blog along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they’re listening to."

1. Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe - Okkervil River

2. We Carry On - Portishead

3. Tap At My Window - Laura Marling

4. Night Terror - Laura Marling

5. Is This Love - Bob Marley

6. You Send Me - Sam Cooke

7. The Movie's Over - Cog

And I tag: benpayne, markdeniz, ph8, ashmael, azhure, chrisbarnes, mikandra

I think it is definitely a day to celebrate the darker side of Australian culture.

Just take a look at this link:

http://ozhorrorscope.blogspot.com/2008/06/news-black-magazine-launch.html

A hearty congratulations to Angela and Shane at Brimstone Press.

[related link: http://www.blackmag.com.au]

The good news? My "Stars of Speculative Fiction" interview with markdeniz has appeared over on his blog (http://markdeniz.blogspot.com/2008/05/stars-of-speculative-fiction-14-andrew.html). It was a lot of fun doing the interview with Mark. I hope you all enjoy it too.

The bad news? I heard about 2 hours ago that my last remaining grandmother had died. It wasn't unexpected, but still, it hits hard. I'll probably see if I can get out of working in the bookshop on the weekend and head up the coast to be with dad. After that, it will be on my way to Kempsey for the funeral, so I might be out of touch for a few days.

Fortuitously, and somewhat unexpectedly, I have found myself to be the recent recipient of a LibraryThing (http://www.librarything.com) Lifetime Membership! (Thanks Tim!) Looks like I'll be giving the site much more of a workout than I first expected.

So far, as a comparison, between LibraryThing and GoodRead (http://www.goodreads.com/) I've found both sites have their pros and cons.

GoodReads definitely looks a lot better at the moment, and the interface is cleaner and simpler to use, but I hear that LibraryThing is due for a re-skinning somewhere in the future. I think this is definitely its biggest problem at the moment though... it looks a bit ugly.

More of my books show up in LibraryThing than they did in GoodReads searches, although LibraryThing also seems to have a lot of dud user entered information against some editions - incorrect Author names mainly, or so many variations on the spelling of an Author's name that it looks messy.

The social aspects of LibraryThing seem quite well integrated and I think this will become more useful to me as I enter more of my books (147 already and that is just the first of 12 shelves!). I've definitely found a lot more of my friends on LibraryThing than I did on GoodReads.

Things I miss in LibraryThing that I like in GoodReads?

The system of 'Shelves' is much better used in GoodReads. Any book I enter can be added to one of three shelves you start off with "Read", "Currently Reading" and "To Be Read". It is very simple to switch your library between these three views. You can also add your own shelves to arrange books by, and this is in addition to the standard 'Tags' cataloguing system used by most sites. This is probably the thing I miss most, and I'd love to see something similar added to LibraryThing. I know you can mark books as 'Currently Reading' and 'To Be Read', but the system for doing so is a little bit clumsy. And, even once I'd set a couple of books with those fields, I couldn't work out how to show those views in my Library.

I've only been using it for a day though and have many more books to enter. I'm sure I'll find more in the two systems to compare and contrast, and I'll keep you all updated on what I think.

I've tried a couple of online sites for Readers, including LibraryThing (http://www.librarything.com/) and Shelfari (http://www.shelfari.com/). LibraryThing only allows you to add 200 books to your shelve before you have to pay. 200 books? That's just my To-Be-Read pile! And I'm not sure if I'm into it enough to pay a yearly fee. Shelfari was okay, but the web interface seemed a little clunky to me and I didn't really enjoy the experience - I saw it as a sort of FaceBook for Books and I HATE FACEBOOK!

So, the other day jonathanmaberry invited me over to GoodReads (http://www.goodreads.com/) and I've got to say, I'm impressed! So far, GoodReads is totally free. Some pages have Google AdSense adverts, but they're unobtrusive... invisible for me actually as I use an AdBlocker. You can add as many books as you like to you shelves and the site is very simple to use and not overladen with features. So far, I'm very much enjoying my time there.

If you're interested in checking it out, make sure you add me to your friend list:

http://www.goodreads.com/friend/i?i=LTM2MDU5MjcyNzM6MzYx%0A

Well, the dog part of the title is as in "as sick as a..." which is the way I've been the last 2 days. Came down with a chill on Saturday night and have been feeling like crap pretty much ever since. Shivering one minute, sweating like it's 40ºC the next. To make it worse, Kylie is away in Brisbane on business again until Thursday night and the kids are home on school holidays. Plus there is now a two day backup of client work, with a new job I should have been starting today but now won't get to until tomorrow afternoon.

The cat part? I just had to tell you what an amazing and wonderful cat I have. Her name is Cobweb, and she's almost 2 1/2 yrs old. The thing I like best about my Cobweb is that she never harms other animals except for cockroaches. All other animals she catches alive, perfectly unharmed, and brings them to me. So far this has mainly consisted of insects - crickets, stick insects (her favourite), and cicadas, lots of cicadas. Last summer she brought me: 10 green grocers, 8 small black princes, 3 large black princes and a cherry nose! All alive and perfectly unharmed.

I can always tell when she is at the door with something to show me. She has a special call just for that. It is always the front door too. When I get there, she'll be sitting on the mat with whatever she has caught on the floor in front of her. If it tries to get away, she'll gently push it with her paw until it is in front of her again. I open the door to have a look and she moves back, always sitting at a curious and respectful distance. I (and generally the entire family) will gather around for a look. Cobweb will sits close, watching carefully, head tilted as if listening as we debate exactly what species and genus the creature belongs too (hey, we're a David Attenborough family, what can I say). Cobweb is never interested in harming the animal. Only making sure it is alive so that we can see it, and so that we can praise her. Once we've all had a look, she's happy for us to place it back in a tree or under a rock. She never tries to go for it a second time.

This, to me, is all pretty special. But there are probably 3 things that make this especially amazing.

1 - Next door's cat - a beautiful sleek and black male we call 'Max' - has been spending more time at our house that he has at his since he was a kitten. Cobweb taught him how to hunt and stalk, but now Max is bigger and asserting his 'maleness' Cobweb isn't as impressed or happy to have him around as she once was. Nevertheless, Max is relentless in his pursuit of affection and has become our adopted cat. Unfortunately, he also isn't as nature loving as Cobweb. When Cobweb brings a stick insect or cricket to the door now, she doesn't stand back... she stands guard! Max is always curious to see what we were looking at. The first time he saw us all out on the porch he rushed up to have a look. Cobweb let him. But, as soon as Max saw the green grocer cicada wandering around the porch, he pounced! Cobweb was not at all impressed with this behaviour and chased him off quick smart. She's never given him a second chance. Now, she sits on the edge of the porch like a meercat while we play naturalists and gives Max a beating with her paws every time he tries to get close.

2 - One day a month ago I heard her call. But it was a stranger sound than normal. It was her 'Hey! Come look what I found!' call, but muffled. When I went to the door I suddenly understood why. She sat there on the mat, looking at me, and, as I opened the screen door, she opened her mouth. Out flew a butterfly!! She had caught a butterfly and had held it in her mouth, alive, even as she called me from the door. The butterfly was fine. It fluttered around, a bit confused for a minute or two, and then flew off. I can barely catch a butterfly with my hands and be sure it is going to survive, let alone know I'm not going to damage its wings. But, my cat caught a butterfly in her mouth! How many people have a cat who opens her mouth and butterflies come out?

3 - Saturday night, she called again. I went to the door and there she was with a live mouse between her feet. A mouse! The mouse sat there, scared out of its wits. It didn't try to run. We looked at it and there wasn't a single mark on it. Not a tooth imprint, or a scratch, or even a patch of saliva-matted mouse fur. This mouse was pristine! And yet, it had been caught by a cat and brought to my front door. Max came along and tried to get a look, but Cobweb would have none of it. She hissed and batted at him until he pulled away. Max went and sat in a corner and glared at Cobweb. How could she betray him? Betray all felines, by protecting a mouse? Cobweb waited until we'd picked up the mouse and put it in a shoebox and then she herded Max inside our house. If you need someone to herd cats, then you need another cat because she did a brilliant job. Once Max and Cobweb were inside, we took the mouse and let it go in the school field across the road. It was very happy to get away, but I don't think it really had much of an idea of just how lucky it was. How many mice can say they got caught by a cat purely for the purpose of non-intrusive examination? Or that they were guarded against feline threat by a cat? Only in Stuart Little have I ever heard of such strange things.

So, the guarding, the butterfly, the mouse. I'm glad our cat is a nature lover and not a nature destroyer. I guess all those documentaries we watch snuggled up together on the lounge must account for something.

[Edited]
Lots of good news for me today, which has left me in quite a bouncy mood.

Stoker Award winner Jonathan Mayberry (2006 First novel, 2007 Non-fiction) has requested one of my images for his forthcoming non-fiction work "THEY BITE! - Supernatural Predators in Folklore, Fiction and Film". My 'Gryphon' image - along with a short interview - will appear beside the fantastical creations of many other artists. The book is the 3rd part in his non-fiction trilogy which began with "Vampire Universe", and then the Stoker winning "Cryptopedia: An Occult and Paranormal Dictionary".

I also found out last night that my story 'The Haunting that Jack Built' will be appearing in issue #42 of Aurealis (due out towards the end of this year).

Add to that the announcement of the line-up for Gilgamesh Press's "In the Footsteps of Gilgamesh" anthology - for which I'll be contributing a far-future story of a post-human and his dog called "He Who Saw the Deep" - and I'm a pretty happy camper at the moment.

I have a couple of other things in the pipeline that I can't quite mention yet, but hopefully soon.

And I still have a story called "The Message" out for the Morrigan Books anthology 'Voices', but the deadline for subs there isn't 'til 1st May so I still have a couple of weeks before I hear anything on that one. I normally would have used that extra time to try and polish up the story more, but I was pretty happy with it and worried I'd stuff it up if I started playing with it, so out it went without me agonising over things for a change. I think I followed the theme quite well, so fingers crossed.

Lately, I've been finding myself away from home and with the time to write. I don't have a laptop, so that sort of portability is out for me and I'm looking at other alternatives.

Probably the most obvious choice is GoogleDocs (http://docs.google.com), or a similar web-based word processor. My question is - is anyone else out there using GoogleDocs, or another web-based processor? And, how successful (or unsuccessful) has that been for you?

Things are looking worse and worse for the upcoming Keanu Reeves remake of 'The Day The Earth Stood Still".

But then again, I suppose I should have been expecting the worst to begin with.

http://io9.com/377910/keanus-remake-ruins-our-day

Finished 'The Message' last night, my story for Morrigan Books' forthcoming "Voices" anthology. Brought it in pretty much right on the 7,000 word maximum, but I was panicking a bit as I neared the last 1,000 words. Wasn't sure if I could do it, but it proved to be pretty much the perfect length for the story I had in my head.

I think I pulled it off okay. My wife read the entire thing and only picked up her pen twice in the whole 30 pages. That's pretty much a record... usually the pages are covered in red ink. But that's exactly why she is my first reader - she's brutal and honest. The fact that she was too engrossed in the story to make critique bodes very well indeed.

Just have to settle back now and wait until after the 1st May and see if the editors think it is any good.

"This is how flash fiction should be written – sharp, brilliant images conjured by amazingly few words. Cummings’ aptitude for flash fiction is evident in every carefully chosen phrase."
– Stephanie Gunn, HorrorScope.

SHARDS is the debut collection of dark flash fiction from Ditmar Award winner and multi-award nominee Shane Jiraiya Cummings, illustrated throughout and with a cover by me!

SHARDS features forty short, sharp tales, including stories that have appeared in Shadowed Realms, Apex Digest, Dark Wisdom, Horror Literature Quarterly, Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, Borderlands, Shadow Box, Book of Shadows, Simulacrum, and Shorthorror.com, plus ten originals.

Each story is illustrated with full-page black and white artwork by Andrew McKiernan (39 illustrations in all, plus a full-colour cover).

SHARDS is now available for pre-order from Ticonderoga Publications (in limited numbered edition (500 only) and an ultra exclusive signed and numbered edition (30 only)). The limited edition is available for a short time at the low price of less than $20.

SHARDS is also available in a special pre-order bundle along with Sean Williams' 'best of' collection MAGIC DIRT and Lewis Shiner's upcoming collection LOVE IN VAIN. Save by ordering all three in one hit!

The collection is expected to be published in October 2008.

I'll post some images of the internal illustrations over the next couple of weeks so you can all get a sneak peek at the inside.

 

Over at the LJ of Eneit Press/Morrigan Books editor  markdenizhas posted the final line-up for the forthcoming "In Bad Dreams 2: Where Death Stalks" anthology.

And here it is:

1. Smiley - Martin Livings
2. Scent - Carole Johnstone
3. Morphs - Ian Whates
4. We’ll Take Care of You - Gary McMahon
5. City of the Damned - Eric Steele
6. The Misfortune - Gerard Brennan
7. Hitman - Jeff Parish
8. Our Trespasses - Kurt Kirchmeier
9. Big Muddy - Shannon Page
10. Narthex - Stephanie Gunn
11. Wayang Kulit - L. J. Hayward
12. KTV - Walt Jarvis
13. Daivadana - Andrew J. McKiernan

Congratulations to all those who made it in, and commiserations to those that missed out. I hear that the quality of submissions was really high, and the editors' decisions really tough.

Now I just have to wait to see what sort of edits they want me to do to my story.

I was finally able to download Nine Inch Nails' suprise new album 'Ghosts I-IV' this morning.

I've almost had a full run through, and I'm very happy to say this is one of the best sequences of music I have heard for a VERY long time!

'Ghosts I-IV' is the totally unexpected instrumental 'album' from NIN. It arrived late Monday via their website in various downloadable formats and pricing options.

It's similar to Radiohead's recent release of In Rainbows... except, this takes the concept so much further.

You can get the first nine tracks as DRMless MP3s for free.

Or pay $5 US for all 36 tracks (Yes, Thirty Six Tracks!) plus a PDF and some desktop wallpapers and stuff.

Or pay $10 US for a 2 CD set (for release April 8)

Or pay $75 US for the Deluxe Package with a hardcover fabric slipcase containing: 2 audio CDs, 1 data DVD with all 36 tracks in multi-track format, and a Blu-ray disc with Ghosts I-IV in high-definition 96/24 stereo and accompanying slideshow. So, for all the musos out there, that everything you need to totally remix and reuse the individual album tracks exactly as if you had access to the masters!

Not only that, but it has all be released under a Creative Commons license! So, you are actually allowed to remix and re-release the tracks in any way you feel is possible.

That is really creative freedom, and a mighty move from Trent Reznor now that he is free of record labels.

But, most importantly, this is an absolutely amazing album. 36 tracks of instrumentals, no lyrics or vocals whatsoever, and not once does it get boring. The mix of instruments and sounds and beats cover a wide range, often well outside the normal NIN repertoire... but despite that, it is still always a NIN album. You can still hear everything that has gone before, refined and polished until it sounds new. The tracks are atmospheric, orchestral, tribal and tortured. There is beauty, and depression and sadness and joy. But gone is the 'teen angst' of Reznor's lyrics - finally, thankfully, as he is a 43 yr old man afterall - and all we are left with is a journey of sound driven emotion.

It is a sound that has been driving my writing all morning. I've already done my thousand words. They rushed by as the music played. I was still listening to it all, hearing every instrument, every sonic blast and keening note. My writing fed off the sound of this new album. It put me in my 'writing space' so quickly and easily, and helped me stay there until I was done. And, I'm happy with almost every word I typed!

I'm off to put some washing on the line and make some lunch (another smoothie). But after that, I'm keen to have another listen and do some more writing before the boys get home from school.

So, while I'm off doing that, why don't you head on over to http://ghosts.nin.com/ and sample the free tracks. If you like melodic, emotional, and highly intelligent music - even if you think you don't like NIN - and you enjoy writing Spec-Fic to a soundtrack, I think you will definitely like this album.

I've just heard news from the Eneit Press camp that my story 'Diavadana' is one of the first two stories to be accepted for the forthcoming 'In Bad Dreams 2' anthology!

Here are the stats so far from markdeniz:
Stories received: 124
Stories accepted: 2 (by gerardbrennan and ashr501)
Stories held for second stage: 26
Rejections: 96

I'm pretty damn happy about this. I knew I had a pretty good story to tell, and thought I'd told it as best it could be, but I was still worried that it was too long. First draft was 15,000 words!

The CritMonsters group are to be thanked and commended for their excellent crits. They helped get rid of all the really rough edges and made me think a lot more about the story. Nathan Burrage then came along and tore right through the story. He made me really understand where the words were deficient in bringing across the ideas I needed to express. Due to their efforts the story lost a major character and over 3,500 words. It gained another 1,000 words here and there in building up the characters a lot more too, but all my readers felt a bit more character background and motive was necessary. All these readers helped make the story a much, much better story. I doubt it would have been accepted without their suggestions and advice. So, thanks guys and gals.

Thanks also (of course) to markdeniz and eneit for liking the story enough to accept it.

As you might guess, I'm pretty happy right now :)

Thank you to all those who wished me well with my dental surgery. All done, and probably not as bad as I thought it was going to be.

My jaw and mouth are still very swollen and the stiches already itch inside my mouth, but other than that I'm surprised at how well I'm doing. I was in surgery at 4pm Friday afternoon and by 7pm I was struggling to wake up in recovery. No nausea, just the struggle to drag myself out of the 'sleep'. It took me a good 30 minutes to properly wake up, then they gave me some jelly and icecream. As long as I could keep it down I could go home. And, eat it I did. I was starving, having not eaten anything for 24hours, and it didn't make me a bit ill.

I still can't open my mouth too far so all that's going in at the moment are lots of strawberry smoothies, yoghurt, Milo icecream bars (they're great! so creamy!) and the best of all... banana custard. I wasn't too sure about this one when my wife brought it home in the shopping, but one mouthful was enough to have me addicted. Beautiful stuff it is. I could just drink it straight from the carton. And it is great hot as well as cold!

The pain killers they've given me are quite good too, and have really helped me sleep. I have to sleep upright for 3 days, propped up in bed with pillows, and I really couldn't sleep that way normally (I'm a face-down sleeper) but the drugs put me out like a light. The stitches are disolving stitches that should disappear in a week or so, and I've got a post-op checkup on Monday week just to make sure everything is fine. I think it will be though.

After all my fears and worries about this (and yes, I was quite freaked out) I can definitely say that the doctors and staff made everything wonderful. They were great, and really good at making me feel at ease both before and after the operation. I can't say it has totally released me from my dislike of dentists, but it has definitely gone a good way towards lessening that dislike. I won't be making the mistake of putting something like this off for so long again.

I spent all yesterday in bed, doing nothing but reading. I finished Iain M.Banks' new Culture novel 'Matter' - which I enjoyed (more so in the 2nd half of the book) but don't rank it as one of his SF best. "Use of Weapons" still takes that prize, with "Consider Phlebas" and/or "Feersum Endjinn" the next favourites. Matter is probably up there with 'Look to Windward' but has more the style of 'Inversions'. Some readers will probably get a little confused with the 'fantasy' elements of the novel, but I think they worked quite well. All in all, I thought that the book was very much an expansion on what he had attempted previously with 'Inversions' (that Culture novel that isn't really a Culture novel). I think I liked his recent 'mainstream' "The Steep Approach to Garbadale" better though.