David Alastair Hayden

Alter­nate Title: The Sea­son of Famil­ial Obligation

Some of you may be won­der­ing: Where are all the books David promised us in late 2011? I’ve read Wrath of the White Tigress and The Storm Dragon’s Heart and now I want more. More, damn it, more!

I am deeply sorry. Noth­ing would make me hap­pier than hav­ing more books out for you to read.

I am work­ing on the next book, but things are going slowly. And at this point I’m four months behind on my pub­lish­ing sched­ule. It’s likely that I’ll be five months behind once Decem­ber ends.

I’ve been stressed by inter­mit­tent famil­ial oblig­a­tions over the last 16 months. For most of that time I was able to keep pace with my work and so I thought I could get out a num­ber of books late this year in spite of it all. In June, the stress of oblig­a­tions ratch­eted up but then cooled off again. I was a month behind pace then, but fig­ured I could catch up.

Then came September.

I won’t go into details because they would do nei­ther me nor you any good and most of it is pri­vate in nature. Suf­fice to say, my par­ents have been in dire need of my assis­tance. And when my time isn’t directly occu­pied by help­ing them, I find myself unable to work. The stress of the sit­u­a­tion some­times leaves my mind vacant of cre­ativ­ity and I want noth­ing but rest or some mind­less endeavor.

In short, I’m hav­ing to take care of things only I can take care of, things I do out of love and respect for my fam­ily. Things that are not pleas­ant and leave me lit­tle cre­ative time.

But in Jan­u­ary, my time will be my own again. The bits of work I can man­age now will become tor­rents and new work shall appear.

If you’ve always thought Avatar: The Last Air­ben­der needed a shot of Johnny Quest vibe, this here’s the book for you!

The Storm Dragon’s Heart

Ture­sobei dreamed of adven­ture, a way to prove he was no longer a child.

Wiz­ards should be care­ful what they wish for.

Des­tined to become his clan’s next high wiz­ard, stu­dious Ture­sobei has con­stantly strug­gled to live up to other people’s demands and expec­ta­tions, but now he’s had enough.

When his treasure-hunting father arrives with impor­tant news to dis­cuss with the cur­rent high wiz­ard, Ture­sobei spies on their secret meet­ing and acci­den­tally foils an assas­si­na­tion attempt. As a reward his father invites him on an expe­di­tion to find an arti­fact known as the Storm Dragon’s Heart.

But when dis­as­ter strikes, their quest becomes a race for survival.

Aided by a sassy ninja cat-girl and a mys­te­ri­ous diary that trans­forms into a winged famil­iar, Ture­sobei must face deadly cultists, venge­ful spir­its, and a mad wiz­ard from a rival clan who’s deter­mined to use the arti­fact to destroy Turesobei’s homeland.

The Storm Dragon’s Heart will delight read­ers with a thrilling tale of exotic lands, mys­ti­cal crea­tures, for­bid­den love, and fast-paced adven­ture. (Ages 10 and up)

Pur­chase the ebook at: Ama­zon or Barnes & Noble.

The print book is com­ing later this month!

Galac­tus would never select me. I’m a ter­ri­ble her­ald. Nor­rin Radd I am not, though I, too, seek Shalla-Bal. I have been sit­ting on impor­tant news, fail­ing to alert you, dear reader and friend, that my novel of heroic sword and sor­cery adven­ture, Wrath of the White Tigress, will soon debut as the first novel from Typ­ing Cat Press! [1]

WotWT will be avail­able from Ama­zon, B&N, iBooks, and other fine ebook retail­ers at the highly afford­able price of $4.99. The spe­cific release date is yet unknown (though some­time in the last days of June). I will let you know as soon as I can. (The Kin­dle and Nook ver­sions will appear first.)

The print ver­sion will fol­low in late July, priced around $10–12. Above and to the right, you can see the beau­ti­ful cover art cre­ated for WotWT by San­dara. This same cover will soon appear on the Podi­o­books ver­sion as well. (I’m look­ing into doing an Audi­ble ver­sion of the book for those of you who’d like to pur­chase the entire audio­book with­out interruptions.)

WRATH OF THE WHITE TIGRESS

He thought he was a hero.
She showed him the truth.
Now he’ll do any­thing to stop the man who made him a monster.

For twenty years Jaska Bavadi has faith­fully served the Palym­far Order and its Grand­mas­ter, the pow­er­ful wiz­ard Salahn, but an encounter with Zyrella Anthari, last high priest­ess of the White Tigress, shat­ters the spell that chained Jaska’s mind.

Now faced with the hor­rors he unknow­ingly com­mit­ted against peo­ple he swore to pro­tect, Jaska must put Salahn’s reign of cru­elty to an end. Together, he and Zyrella race to save the White Tigress and stop Salahn from open­ing the Gates of the Under­world. An army of palym­far war­riors stands in their way, but the dan­ger­ous secrets that cloud their des­tinies threaten to doom them first.

In the tra­di­tion of ­­Michael Moor­cock, David Gem­mell, and Glen Cook, Wrath of the White Tigress deliv­ers a thrilling tale sword & sor­cery fans will love.

[1] Full Dis­clo­sure: I am a co-founder of Typ­ing Cat Press.

Over a month ago, on Hal­loween week­end, I went to World Fan­tasy Con­ven­tion 2010. And I am writ­ing about it at last. Yes, it was so awe­some that I was over­whelmed and could not man­age to trans­late the expe­ri­ence into words. Or, per­haps you’d rather I said that I was imme­di­ately engulfed by NaNoW­rimo in Novem­ber and couldn’t find the time? And then Thanks­giv­ing, of course.

Those of you who know me best will sus­pect that out­side of writ­ing fic­tion I’ve just been my usual lazy self. Because I just don’t work hard on stuff that doesn’t involve the use of dia­logue and actions scenes. (Maybe those dishes in the sink should speak and have sword fights?) Any­way, to that I say: Stop know­ing me so well. Also, I find blog­ging dif­fi­cult, like I do all writ­ing that isn’t fic­tion or poetry. I’m not cer­tain why that is. But maybe this site needs posts writ­ten in fic­tion style.

Any­way … World Fan­tasy Con­ven­tion is a yearly gath­er­ing of fans to cel­e­brate fan­tasy lit­er­a­ture and give out the World Fan­tasy Awards. And by fans I mean, 850 peo­ple (atten­dance is capped), most of whom work in the indus­try or wish to work in the indus­try. Agents, edi­tors, artists, and writ­ers both pub­lished and aspir­ing. Sure, sure, fans also attend, but this is really a big fan­tasy pub­lish­ing hob­nob­bing affair. At WFC you will not find cos­tumes or gam­ing, and the dealer’s room is filled only with book deal­ers. It is also a con­ven­tion that moves around from year to year. This one was in Colum­bus, Ohio.

» Read the rest of this entry «

On Labor Day week­end I attended Dragon*Con! And I shall dis­cuss now, belat­edly, my expe­ri­ences. Dragon*Con is the one event I attend every year with­out fail. Notice I said event, not con­ven­tion. Dragon*Con is my new year mark, sig­nal­ing a time for reflec­tion fol­lowed by a fresh start, a time for set­ting new goals. I might miss a hol­i­day cel­e­bra­tion or such. But I will not miss D*C. For years, we couldn’t afford vaca­tions or other cons, but we always saved up for D*C because it was the best bang for our buck. (Okay, okay. Pep­per and I have a Christ­mas Eve rit­ual that we’ve never altered in 14 years. But that’s it.)

Fairy Pep­per and Me

How can I best describe D*C to you? Well, as my good friend Lou Anders put it, “Dragon*Con is like Spring Break in a Fan­tasy World or some sort of Mid­dle Earth Mardi Gras.” (Though I never knew the hob­bits were so into goth and steam­punk.)  Tens of thou­sands of peo­ple into alter­na­tive stuff. There is no one aspect that defines D*C. It is not a comics, gam­ing, sci-fi, or anime con. It is all those things and more. It is the largest fan con­ven­tion, cov­er­ing fans of pretty much every­thing geeky and cool.

I’ve only ever had one dis­ap­point­ing D*C, when I was sick the whole time, and I still enjoyed myself. So how was this year’s extrav­a­ganza? For me, 2010 was the best yet. I think because of all the new peo­ple I met and just a gen­eral sense of well-being and con­fi­dence. Despite fam­ily crises back home that have tugged at my san­ity the last few months, I arrived at the con as healthy and happy as I have ever been, though in sore need of sleep before it even started.

I got to see a lot of the usual faces. Good friends I have known and loved for years like Will, Melissa, Jason, and Celeste. (Though I missed a few friends who were absent this year!) Spent time with some new friends such as Lou Anders and Rene and Ben Sears.

with Lou Anders and John Picacio

Met John Pica­cio, of whom I’d heard so much that was good, and found that it was all true. (I’m inter­view­ing him for the Octo­ber issue of Red­stone Sci­ence Fic­tion.) Met other cool and inter­est­ing peo­ple like Mike Resnick, Clay and Susan Grif­fith, Jon Sprunk, Irene Gallo, Jill Maxick, and Todd Lock­wood (who by acci­dent called my wife Pep­per, Pep­per, thus cement­ing the nick­name I’d already given her). Mr Resnick kindly gave me much-appreciated advice. Oh, Howard Andrew Jones of Black Gate mag­a­zine and Eliz­a­beth and Dun­can of Dark­cargo. I’m cer­tain to have for­got­ten some folks, and for that I’m sorry.

with Jason and Celeste

I went to pod­cast and writ­ing pan­els. I went to con­certs (CruXshad­ows and Voltaire). Ran­dom danc­ing. An all night rave. Drinks at a cou­ple of Hyatt bars. Will and I cut­ting up and get­ting on Pepper’s nerves. Fine din­ing at the Land­mark Cafe. Truly, much fun was had. Oh yeah, bought quite a few books, of course. And Scott Sigler’s The Starter! Stayed at the Sher­a­ton this time. Will stay else­where next year, just to shake things up. Had a nice court­yard room. Per­haps the Marriott.

One bad thing about D*C 2010, the only bad thing for me: I thought the wait in line to pick up my pre-reg badge was ridicu­lous, worst I’ve ever had at an hour and thirty, but then I learned that peo­ple were hav­ing to some­times wait three and four hours. (D*C, some­thing must be done.)

Rogue from CruXshadows

Of course, the con was big­ger this year, as always. But to me it seemed to increase dra­mat­i­cally. I don’t know what the num­bers were, but I’ve been to nine of these things and I have a sort of feel for the crowds, I think. (I think lots of things, you know, and some of them must be accu­rate.) Fri­day was absolutely nuts! The crowds were Saturday-sized from pre­vi­ous years. Sat­ur­day felt a lit­tle big­ger. (The Mar­riott was rock­ing with peo­ple and cos­tumes! Took 20 min­utes to nav­i­gate through there.) Sun­day was nor­mal Saturday-sized, like Fri­day had been. And Mon­day seemed busier as well.

Pep­per and I helped at the Pyr Books booth on Mon­day after­noon. And assisted with the break down and pack­ing after­ward. She accom­plished more than I did, steer­ing in cus­tomers and giv­ing out pins, telling peo­ple what Pyr was about. (Never under­es­ti­mate her. I don’t.) I was so tired by that point and found it dif­fi­cult to be social, but I did man­age to sell a num­ber of James Enge’s Blood of Ambrose and This Crooked Way. (Social­iz­ing, you should know, is never easy for me, but it keeps get­ting eas­ier these days, so I must be doing some­thing right.)

Pri­or­i­tiz­ing … Dragon*Con is so big with so much going on that there’s no way you can get to every­thing. Just isn’t pos­si­ble. This year was fan­tas­tic, but there were a few impor­tant things I missed out on. I think it may be time to phase out one or two reg­u­lar activ­i­ties that have worn thin in order to do some new stuff. I’ve been much more social at the con the last two years, and that’s a good thing. I cer­tainly plan to keep doing more of that.
And I have some­thing spe­cial in mind for next year. We’ll see how it works out. Yes, it’s a secret. No, I wouldn’t stay up all night won­der­ing about what I’m up to.

Any­way, big shout out to all my friends. With­out you guys, the con wouldn’t be the same!

I for­got to men­tion that my inter­view with Lou Anders was linked by io9 and scored over 10,000 hits. They hooked it with “which novel is sci­ence fiction’s Harry Potter?”

Good stuff.

The io9 link.

Who am I? That seems like a good place to start.

I’m a scrib­bler and pod­caster who loves pulp sto­ries, espe­cially sword & sor­cery tales. My favorites are the dark, edgy ones, along the lines of Karl Edward Wagner’s Kane nov­els. It’s hard to find such sto­ries, so I write them. I call my style Dag­gers & Dev­il­try. Because it sounds cool and appro­pri­ate. And because the term “sword & sor­cery” was defiled by Hol­ly­wood cash-grabbers.

My first three nov­els of heroic fan­tasy involve set­tings inspired by East Asia, India, and Morocco. South­ern Europe in the Mid­dle Ages inspired the fourth, but I sprin­kled plenty of exoti­cism in, to be sure. I’m not opposed to writ­ing mod­ern pulp fan­tasy, or even sci-fi. In fact, I have plans for such nov­els. How­ever, they will still be Dag­gers & Dev­il­try in style.

I live in Birm­ing­ham, Alabama. My favorite sub­jects out­side of writ­ing are Dao­ism, Tai­ji­quan, pro­fes­sional foot­ball, Crim­son Tide foot­ball, ancient his­tory, diet, and fitness.

I enjoy play­ing and design­ing role-playing games. In fact, my love of pulp fan­tasy began in 1990 when a copy of the Storm­bringer role-playing game (4th edi­tion with a cover by Michael Whe­lan) caught my eye in a comic book shop just out­side of Eglin Air Force Base in Val­paraiso, Florida. Years of read­ing Michael Moor­cock, David Gem­mell, Fritz Leiber, Robert E. Howard, and oth­ers fol­lowed. Embrac­ing inter­ests aroused by the genre, I stud­ied his­tory, lit­er­a­ture, and reli­gion at the Uni­ver­sity of Alabama. (You can’t really do any­thing but write, teach, or work retail if you major in such subjects.)

I don’t travel much, but I reli­giously attend Dragon*Con in Atlanta each year. If you’re going to be there, drop me an email. We’ll gather and chat a bit. I usu­ally don’t bite.

Geez, I could go on for­ever, but I think you’ve heard enough for now.