Status

The long-delayed delivery from my printer arrived yesterday and I finally got the chance to see both issues of Eclectic Projects side-by-side for the first time. In a lot of ways, these magazine issues are my platonic ideal of a book: 80 to 100 pages, self-contained, with a standardised design creating unity as things progress. Individually, the issue doesn’t seem like something of value, but stack two issues together and they become interesting objects. Stack twelve together, and they’ll like like an impressive body of work.

In other news, we’re on the countdown to my Birthday on the 18th and the anniversary of my father’s death on the 19th, and I’ve hit the traditional stretch where my mental health is wobbly. Taking it very easy on myself this week, and reminding myself that it’s not the week to be making big decisions.

ON THE DOCKET

Off to catch up with my weekly Write Club crew this morning, followed by an afternoon of graphic design and movving computers around as I try to tame my desk.

PETER M. BALL INBOX: 20

BRAIN JAR INBOX: 17

BRAIN JAR SUBMISSION QUEUE: 5

RECENT READING

March tends to be the month where I catch up on romance reading, and I’ve been powering my way through a ten-novel boxed set I picked up a few months back. The highlight so far is Sarina Bowen’s The Year We Fell Down (not a surprise, as I’d loved her True North series back in 2020, but hadn’t clicked it was the same author).

RECENT VIEWING

I caught David Leitch’s Bullet Train on the streams yesterday, and was immediately charmed by its clear-sighted dedication to the movie it wanted to be. Back in the 90s, I was an enormous fan of Robert Rodriguez’s Desperado, a low-budget action film in which Antonio Banderas goes on a rampage to get revenge for… well, if I’m honest, the plot to Desperado is rather flimsy. What makes it work is its commitment to highly stylised action blending neo-western themes with Hong Kong action influences. The story is weak, but the film is dazzling and aesthetically different to everything else on the market.

Bullet Train reminds me of Desperado in all the right ways, a melange of styles and storylines that weave together. There’s a precision to it on the plotting level – what plot there is is flimsy and improbable, but it’s also not the point. The action and whip-smart dialogue is the point, and the improbable elements of the plot are plastered over with an impeccable commitment to internal consistency. In a world where many films seem mystified by the basics of Chekhov’s gun, Bullet Train introduces an arsenal of plot devices and weaves them together with utter confidence.

As is customary of a Saturday Morning, I’ve put new fiction into the world over on my Patreon. I Hear The Call is a weird, slipstream-esque science fiction tale about a golden beam of light that calls to the inhabitants of a small, isolated Aussie town and slowly lifts them into the sky. We join the story several months into the event, when the military has erected a cordon to prevent anyone from leaving and the younger locals are doing their best to kill time by any means necessary.

1.

Outside, in the backyard, Lucas and Micky are shooting at DVDs they nailed up to the fence line. I don’t know where they got the guns, and I don’t really think it matters. We all collect stuff now, something to kill the hours. You just pick a focus and go house-to-house, sifting through the detritus of other people’s lives. It started with Mickey and coffee mugs, then collars from pets long disappeared. Lucas decided on guns, found too damn many of ‘em. Rifles and handguns and this antique SLR that Micky’s grandfather brought home after his time in the army.

It’s been three days since they brought the guns home. It’s a small blessing nobody’s said boo about fighting our way past the cordon, but that won’t last. It cannot. It cannot. None of us want to be here anymore.

All of us are desperate.

2.

Mikey got the idea to host a housewarming, complete with bonfire. I carved up the table with a chainsaw, while Deke invited every remaining woman our age and a handful of the woman that weren’t. He told them about the fire, and he told them about the games room, and he told them about the dope and then we were rolling.

The party was epic. Big fire, big buzz, the sickly sweet odour of pot in the air. Stereo turned up loud, ‘cause our nearest neighbours were three blocks away, and it’s not like the cops were going to come around and stop us.

The party is where it started. Katie Marduk proposed the game, and we were all stoned enough to buy in…

As ever, you can read the story over at Patreon for as little as a buck a month—which gets you all thirty-eight of the stories thus far—or grab it when it comes out in a forthcoming issue of the Eclectic Projects magazine.

ON THE DOCKET

Today is an admin and chores day, where I run the profit and loss for the last few months and figure out what the next three months will look like. It wouldn’t be a lie to say February was grim from a publishing point of view—it’s not my best sales month at the best of times, and selling books is a lot harder when the economy is bad—and the teaching/mentoring income definitely shored up the weaknesses on the publishing side of the business. March promises to reverse that trend, thanks to the duel release of Bites Eyes and Gorgons Deserve Nice things on the Brain Jar side of things.

Also on the list today: newsletter drafting, some website tinkering, continuing on with the proofing. The flat needs to be vacuumed and the kitchen needs cleaning. Laundry, and thinking through next week’s routine, as I’m getting worse at managing what gets done when with the constant switching of tasks during my week. My spouse is off taking care of family today, so I’m mostly trying to get as much done as possible before they return.

PETER M. BALL INBOX: 38

BRAIN JAR INBOX: 16

BRAIN JAR SUBMISSION QUEUE: 5

This week has been an embarrassment of riches regarding writing and publishing news, and just as I was thinking about how strange it would be to write a blog post with nothing big to share… BAM, the Aurealis Awards shortlists dropped with two Brain Jar Press titles included among the finalists (and many more authors who have published with Brain Jar nominated for work they’ve done with other companies).

Congratulations to Kirstyn McDermott, who wrote the fantastic Never Afters series these two books came from. It was an incredible honour to publish them, and it’s great to see the series get the recognition it deserves.

You can see the full Aurealis Awards finalist list here, and it’s full of great aussie speculative fiction for you to try.

You can grab copies of the Never Afters novellas from Brain Jar Press or wherever good books are sold.

ON THE DOCKET

Today, I need to write the last scene in tomorrow’s Saturday Morning Story on Patreon, finish the copyedits on the third issue of Eclectic Projects, get a new Angela Slatter book laid out, and get cracking on a freelance design project now the client has delivered all the details I need. There’s also a mentorship meeting around midday, my beloved is home sick, and I’m running on just a few hours sleep. I’ll be summoning all my resources to keep things on track, and full expect something to go off the rails before lunch time.

Meanwhile, I’ve got the detritus of another 700+ fraudulent orders to clear out of the Brain Jar Press systems after the latest run of fake orders, and the system will only let us clear 20 at a time. It’s going to be a long, irritating process.

PETER M. BALL INBOX: 31

BRAIN JAR INBOX: 13

BRAIN JAR SUBMISSION QUEUE: 4