Thursday, August 9, 2012

"99 Deaths" Gets a Second Life

My short S&S tale "Ninety Nine Deaths of the Monkey God" is up in the current issue #7 of Swords and Sorcery Magazine

What happens when the hunters become the hunted and assassins drop like flies? (I just made up that tagline)  This is the story of a mercenary on a mission to disrupt an evil cult pressing for war. My story “Hel Awaits” also appeared in the March issue of Swords & Sorcery.

Set far outside geographically of a work in progress Gods & Robbers yet still within that worlds realm 99DotMG follows Kold ~ a thug, reaver, assassin, etc who will eventually be a contender (that is likely the best choice of words at the moment) in that forthcoming novel.

A large part of my inspiration for the piece beyond Rogue Blades Entertainments call for an Assassin's anthology (it didn't make the cut) was to get into the shoes of one of my characters for the sake of knowing him better later on.

I don't know yet if that worked, but it was an experiment. Its all for the ultimate good and experience, I actually wrote this tale around two year ago.

And to my writer friends who enjoy that kind of thing, they are looking for more S&S tales.

* Though it has nothing really to do with anything, I had to add the fantastic artwork by Daren Bader


11 comments:

Charles Gramlich said...

Cool, I'll check it out!

Charles Gramlich said...

Good tale!

Paul R. McNamee said...

That's great, I'll get over to reading it soon.

nephite blood spartan heart said...

Thanks Charles, I appreciate it.

Thank you Paul.

Adventuresfantastic said...

I'll check it out. I'm sorry you didn't make it into Assassins.

And I love the art.

nephite blood spartan heart said...

It's all good Keith, you live and learn, keep writing and improve. Not to dig at Jason at all(he's got hands full I'm sure) but nobody knows when Assassin's is coming anyhow.

An example ~ my first published short story on the "internets" was "Sailing to Valhalla" my second shot - (RS rejected and thankfully gave some pointers on my first submission "The Hand of Fate" and it was pubbed in Shadows & Light 2) - at getting into Rob Santa's THROUGH BLOOD AND IRON and that still isn't out yet either, was originally supposed to be December of 09!!!

As of right now I have I believe at least 6 (yep, I forget) better make that 8 submissions, I am still waiting to hear anything, even a rejection, back on. And another two accepted stories that I have no idea when they are going to be released.

I'm not bugged about any of this (I don't think) Just saying that it is a chancy thing, you have to be patient, and I'm not usually, but staying positive and sending the stuff out and they will get picked up.

Sword & Sorcery Magazine is paying enough for me and the wife to go out and each get our favorite drink-and that's something great when I'm doing what I love.

Heh, didn't meant to run off on a tangent.

Adventuresfantastic said...

Good advice. Anything you don't publish yourself is going to take time. I've got a story in Assassins and one under consideration for Stealth. Both are in a series I've started that is yet to see print. The latter is the one I'd like to see published because I'm working on the sequel, which I think has the potential to be the stronger of the two. There are two more in progress in this series, and I'm going to try to have one finished in time to submit to HFQ next month.

I've also got a couple of things I want to send to Swords and Sorcery.

Once this move is over, I intend to focus more on writing since I should be able to arrange my workspace the way I want it.

nephite blood spartan heart said...

Very cool. I hear you about the newer stuff being stronger, its all about improving as we go along.

Paul R. McNamee said...

I enjoyed that. I liked the twist at the end, too concerning how the god spoke. :)

The Wasp said...

Fun story. Monkeys make everything better.

nephite blood spartan heart said...

Much appreciated Paul, I'm not even sure where that idea came from.

Thanks Wasp, I remember the title, 99 Deaths of the Monkey God, came to me first and I started filling in the tale.