CM Simpson: Writer & Gamer

So, yesterday, Mack 6 reached 48,000 words. Now, this should be over the half-way mark, and I think it is, but we'll see. The journey continues. Here's an excerpt from yesterday's words: Words from Day 10 (Chapter 21): “We weren’t going to stop.” Mikalesket had joined us, again. “Well, we are, now,” Mack told him. “We took a hit.” “I know. We scanned your system.” “And?” If Mack was surprised the lizardine were monitoring the ship that closely, he didn’t show it. “The repairs are important.” “And the engines?” “They will need a little longer to recalibrate. The repair stop will not interrupt the process.” Mack nodded and looked back to his boards. Mikalesket returned to his position at the back of the command center, and I realized he looked like he was alone. I narrowed my eyes, wondering exactly how many of his security team had accompanied him, and were now scattered around the command center. Mack glanced at me, and then glanced around, fixing the liz...

Mac k 'n' Me: The Transporter's Favour is Book 4 in the Mack 'n' Me 'n' Odyssey series. Mack 'n' Me: The Wolves of Alpha 9 is Book 5. According to Transporter's , Wolves was supposed to be released in January 2019, something it was on track to do, until my world slid sideways and then got busy in June 2018... ...which was when I went in to have a skin lesion checked - and then removed. It turned out to be precancerous, with me receiving that news on the same day my mum told me she'd been diagnosed with terminal cancer and wasn' t expected to see Christmas. That was pretty devastating. A week later, the doctor called and told me they hadn't removed the lesion properly and would have to reopen the nearly healed wound. Fantastic... especially when the second incision almost healed only to reopen a couple of hours after the stitches were taken out. Not so great. I followed that with a week of the flu and then gave myself a case of Tenn...

Writing is happening, but slowly. In amongst the editing and blogging, I’ve just finished a second short story for the month. Set in the Mack ‘n’ Me universe between The Depredides Dance and Mack ‘n’ Me: Blaedergil’s Host , this short story is a novella-length tale of one of the many missions they ran between Books 1 and 2 of the Mack ‘n’ Me ‘n’ Odyssey series. These are the first 500 words – before they go through the editing process: Rogue Retrieval The last person I expected to see when I stepped into the restaurant with the first meals of the night, was Mack—yet there he was, large as life, and twice as mean. When I caught sight of his seven-foot figure leaning against the wall just inside the entrance, it was all I could do not to drop what I was carrying and bolt for the alley out back. He was waiting for something, and somehow I didn’t think it was for the concierge to check the bookings in case there was a free table. The way his eyes moved over the patrons e...

Waaay back in June I released a short story called The Depredides Dance , because those events happened straight after the ones in the novel, Mack ‘n’ Me: Origins . In today’s release, Mack ‘n’ Me: The Transporter’s Favour , those events come back to bite the crew of the Shady Marie , and form the basis of the story. However, as one of my beta readers told me, you don’t need to have read either of those two stories (or even books two or three) to enjoy this one—although you might find yourself wanting to read all of them, afterwards. Abby hauled me off the ship before Tens had a chance to stop her—and that’s okay, because I already owed Abs a favour. In fact, it was better than okay, because it showed us how much trouble we hadn’t known we were in. But going against the Star Shadow hunt pack? Nullifying their contract to keep ourselves unchained and at large? That was gonna be something else entirely. Mack ‘n’ Me: The Transporter’s Favour is the fourth science-fictio...