CM Simpson: Writer & Gamer

I have a new cover (by cover artist Mihaela Voicu ) - and a novel releasing tomorrow, based in Michael Anderle's  Age of Magic setting. I'm excited! And I'm not alone... just the last for the week. These are the other titles that were released this week, including Magic Unchained, Book 4 in Jace Mitchell and Michael Anderle's Hand of Magic series - also set in the Age of Magic , The Brownstone Effect, Book 5 in Judith Berens , Martha Carr's and Michael Anderle's Alison Brownstone series, and Ghost Revolution, Book 12 in Michael Todd   and Michael Anderle's Soldiers of Fame and Fortune series. You can find these, and their authors, at the links included above.

From urban fantasy, we move to fantasy – and from pixies and unicorns to vengeful druids and their swamp creatures. This story forms the March 1 in 366 Days of Flash Fiction , and is one of the longer pieces in that collection. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Tiramar and Druid Helovak lived in the swamps of Jevnovar, working with the lizard people to preserve the swampland, as vile as it was. Some call Jevnovar The Reeking Swamp, but no wise man did that where Helovak the Druid could hear them. The swamp might be vile, but Helovak’s temper was worse. He was known for keeping a grudge. He even had a list. A merchant had once called him a ‘hopped up lizard jockey’, and not one of that company’s caravans made it through, or past, Jevnovar from that time on. Helovak’s list was difficult to be crossed off from. Rumours said it was written in blood on the skin of a dark frog. The truth might have been less colourful. The merchant’s

I'll be releasing this shortly... as in 'hopefully today', but, since I have other news coming down the pipe, I figured I'd give you a quick at the cover I created this morning. This is my new cover, for my about-to-be-released science-fiction novella Rogue Retrieval , the latest release in the Mack 'n' Me 'n' Odyssey series . I was doing okay, right up until Mack arrived, with Delight and Pritchard in tow. Retrieved for a rescue mission, I was in more trouble than I knew, and, as if that wasn’t enough, Mack had an agenda of his own. Well, of course, he did…

This week’s verse moves from fantasy to speculation in the form of a garland cinquain. It is taken from 365 Days of Poetry , a collection of mixed-genre poetry released in 2014. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Children, Machines, Human Children. Small, determined bundles of fire, well-kept, learning. Imaginations burn. They watch They watch, absorbing all, both the good and the bad, monitoring their growing world. Learning. Learning and adapting, adopting behaviours, fearlessly copying the grown. Wanting. Wanting to know secrets, the hidden keys to life, wanting to succeed when they’re grown. Machines. Machines, learning machines, computers in their heads processing experiences. Human. Children, absorbing all, adopting behaviours, wanting to succeed when they’re grown. Human ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Y

This week’s short story takes us from wolves escaping from the moon, to some humans escaping from some wolves, as Mack and Cutter try to get themselves out of yet another sticky situation. Welcome to Cloud Door. So, we’ve done this job, and I’m checking our tails are clear, and I find they’re not—and then I find the only way to kick clear is to find the Cloud Door. Only trouble is the Cloud Door’s a legend, and Mack? Well, he’s not too fond of chasing legends. Fortunately, this one’s a no-brainer: we want to live, and that’s got to be enough to make anyone chase a legend, right? Cloud Door is available as a stand-alone short story at the following links: books2read.com/u/bQZGLd . You can also find Kristine Kathryn Rusch's latest free short story over on her blog: kriswrites.com . Why don't you go and check it out?