Introduction to my new edition of Simulation Bleed

I wrote Simulation Bleed as a weekly serial on my website. There were three parts made up of 211 short chapters. I always enjoyed writing it. I'm fond of the main characters: Rainith, Mixt and Nakishdan. Rainith the Red is a particularly bad-tempered and anti-social fairy. Mixt and Nakishdan are two people with many problems who'd much rather be left alone to play video games. None of them are suited to working as government agents. But it happens, and they're stuck with it.

Because it's a serial, it is slightly rambling. I couldn't say it was tightly plotted. Several threads are not pursued and some occurrences are not resolved. However, I did resolve the main events, and as the story involved various timelines, I could claim that any sub-plot that wasn't resolved simply disappeared when history was changed.

When I started Simulation Bleed I planned to write about things I knew about. Firstly, early punk gigs in London. I went to a lot of these, and most of the gigs in the serial are based on concerts I was at. I've seen most of the bands whose records are mentioned. The video game that Nakishdan and Mixt play in the book is mostly based on Mass Effect. I played that trilogy a lot, with great enjoyment. As it turned out, there's a lot of therapy in Simulation Bleed as well. That's not what I'd call a favourite topic of mine but I do know quite a lot about it, from experience.

Several elements of the book such as the gaming, and Nakishdan's liking for all things kawaii, did go on to feature more in the next novel I wrote, Supercute Futures. That's fine, I find both topics very interesting. Despite the occasional loose ends, and some small overlap with a later novel, I haven't revised the serial, preferring to publish it as it was originally written. So here it, Simulation Bleed.

www.amazon.co.uk ||| www.amazon.com

New Werewolf Book, Lonely Werewolf Girl Promotion

I am gearing up for the publication of The Anxiety of Kalix the Werewolf on the 29th August. By which I mean doing nothing at all, really. But the book will come out anyway, even if I have been spending all my time playing Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 on my Playstation. Good games, I enjoyed them both.

In a pre-publication promotion, Lonely Werewolf Girl is on sale at Amazon Kindle this month for just £1.49. So, if you need to read the first book about Kalix MacRinnalch and learn quite why she is such a troubled young werewolf, and why her werewolf clan is generally not that impressed with her, that's a good opportunity.

I've been trying to produce a small promotional interview with myself for the launch of the new book but, for various reasons have failed so far. Next attempt may be more successful. Or may not be, given my total incompetence at almost everything.

Simulation Bleed, my free web serial, is progressing well. I update this on Mondays. At this moment, the main characters are in the middle of an X-Ray Spex gig in a small pub in Putney. Where, by co-incidence, I was myself, quite a long time ago.

Having finished Mass Effect, I have no good Playstation games to play. And I don't have any really good anime to watch either. I've been watching Samurai Champloo, which was produced by the same people who made the really excellent Cowboy Bebop. It's fairly enjoyable, but not up to the same standard as Cowboy Bebop.

Thraxas Final Triumph

With the publication of Thraxas Under Siege, I have now completed my Thraxas project. All nine Thraxas books are now available from ebook stores. I strongly recommend you buy some Thraxas.

This turned out to be a bigger project than I'd anticipated. I'm fatigued. I am now lying on the couch, staring into space in celebration. For the next few days - weeks - months, possibly - I intend to do nothing except play on my Playstation, starting with Mass Effect 2, which, fortunately enough, just arrived in the mail.

Thraxas.com

Thraxas at - Amazon Kindle (UK), Amazon Kindle (US), Nook, Kobo, iTunes, Sony

Thraxas and I are Visiting Elves at the Moment

Thraxas and the Elvish Isles has just appeared as an ebook. Turai being as cold the Ice Queen's grave, Thraxas sailed south for a while. It was a rare excursion from his normal life in the city streets, though not from his excesses of food and drink. Even while surrounded by Elves, Thraxas never loses sight of the central importance of getting a lot of food and drink inside him.

Kindle: US, UK, CA - iBooks -  Kobo

Thraxas and the Elvish Isles is book four in the series. So, with book nine, Thraxas and the Ice Dragon, already being published, I'm now more than half way through my ambitious project to unleash the entire Thraxas series into the world of ebooks. This is going well. Once again, thanks to the people who have given them good customer reviews when they've bought them.

I have also been surrounded by Elves, in a way. It's been snowing in London in the past few days, making it a very poor start to Spring. Not having any Elvish Isles to sail to, I've turned the heating up, and retreated permanently to the couch, applying myself to the first Skyrim downloadable extension, Dragonborn. This, scandalously late, was only recently released for Playstation, though other formats have been available for a long time. So I am once again battling my way through hostile environments, mowing down all opposition, and generally giving hostile wizards, Elves, dragons and bandits a hard time.

In-between I've been reading a biography of Somerset Maugham, one of my favourite authors. Maugham was a great storyteller, even if a reluctant one at times. He really wanted to be a playwright rather than a novelist, because he found it tedious describing things. He thought it would be easier just writing dialogue. I can sympathise with this. Who wants to be describing things all the time? It can be really tedious. Nonetheless, Somerset Maugham was a really fine novelist and short story writer, and I've learned from his technique.

Let Down by Tomb Raider

I'm a huge Tomb Raider fan but I'm disappointed in the new game. I've played the Tomb Raider games right from the start, on the Playstation 1. I've always enjoyed them - apart from the aberrant Angel of Darkness - but I'm not enjoying this as much as I thought I would. It's not that it's a bad game, it's just not Tomb Raider.

Previously I've liked Lara Croft's solitary exploration of gigantic, fantastic tombs. It's like entering in to some sort of brilliant alternative world. Her solitude felt peaceful. So far in this game, there is nothing like that. All the tombs I've come across are small, grubby locations, put in almost as afterthought, and there is certainly nothing peaceful.

Really it's just a gigantic fighting game. You land on an island and fight your way through. There really is a lot of fighting. Sometimes it feels endless. It's well done, but it is not what I want from Tomb Raider. I'm puzzled as to why they've gone this way. Aren't there enough fighting games already? I'm sure there must be. While shooting my way through yet another horde of enemies, I keep thinking 'I wish I was in a big Egyptian tomb, exploring and solving puzzles.'

The game is annoying at the start too, when Lara is so weak. For some reason the game makers decided she needed a new origin - though Lara Croft already had an origin - and this involves making her weak and frightened. She does become stronger later, which is better, but I didn't really see the need for her to be so puny in the first place. When they make new games with male heroes, I don't think they generally make them frightened and hopeless at the start.

Sometimes with games you get moments which are just so good you can hardly believe they did it in a game. I've had that feeling playing Tomb Raider in the past. I recently had it again playing Portal. But there are no moments like that in this Tomb Raider game. Just endless sneaking and fighting. There is nothing beautiful in it, like in previous games. No astonishing graphics like recent Final Fantasy. It's all grime and dirt, and it's all the same really. And if this isn't bad enough, Lara's voice is nowhere near posh enough. I expect Lara Croft to sound like an English aristocrat, not my next door neighbour.

So I am disappointed by this game. It's high quality fighting I suppose, but it's really not Tomb Raider.

[ Character note 1 - If you're going to have a voice-over actor doing a Scottish accent, make sure he can pronounce 'Loch' properly. 'Lok' is fine for non-Scots, but no one from Scotland would pronounce it like that. ]

[ Character note 2 - They made Lara's breasts smaller. Obviously, this is a step forward for the world. As soon I saw her new, smaller breasts, I immediately thought - That's good, how dare the previous games objectify women by giving the character huge breasts. No doubt it is a great relief to everyone that they are smaller in this game. ]

Write something in your blog again. Well all right.

The blog has suffered recently, there's no two ways about it. Partly this is because I've been writing books - slowly - but mainly I've been playing Skyrim. You'll be thrilled to know that my mighty warrior is now capable of beating every enemy encountered, including some very fierce dragons. As a means of avoiding reality, Skyrim is really excellent. So good in fact that I haven't even got round to playing Final Fantasy XIII-2 yet, and I'm really keen to play that.

My only other activity of note has been reading all five issues of Star Magazine - Foxy Entertainment for 1973. This publication being more proof - as if any were needed - of the stupendous greatness of the 70s. It ran for only five issues before being cancelled due to its unbridled enthusiasm for the Hollywood teenage groupie scene. Apparently this didn't go down well with everyone.

Star manages to use the word Foxy four times on the cover, topping it off with Superfox. It's quality journalism. There are interviews with Marc Bolan. And adverts for portable handbag-sized 45rpm record players. So I have been reading this quite enthusiastically, in between long sessions at my playstation.

All five issues of Star Magazine are online at http://www.star1973.com/

And talking of Hollywood, progress continues to be made with the Lonely Werewolf Girl film option. Slow progress, but things are still moving.

Determined Game Playing

I've been playing Portal on my Playstation, at the expense of all other activity. The experience fits in very well with two characteristics I have. One, I tend to be far behind other people in discovering things. Two, I then become completely obsessed with them.

After a friend recommended the game to me, I bought it and then worked my way through it in a determined fashion, meanwhile thinking to myself 'This is the best game ever invented.' (I can become over-enthusiastic.)

So, I was some years behind millions of other gamers in playing Portal. But in a way this has turned out well because the second game has just been released. After finishing the first game I didn't have to wait any time for a new one, I just bought Portal 2 and kept on playing.

My obsession can also extend to merchandise. I've been wondering if I could justify buying myself a companion cube. I'd like one. They do look like they'd make good companions. And there are some t-shirts I'd like too. The Valve store only operates in America but they do do international shipping, so I could rush them an order.

On the related subject of video games made into films - which I also saw later than other people - I watched Prince of Persia but I was disappointed. There's something wrong with he film. Well, being based on a video game it's completely stupid, obviously, but that wasn't the real problem. I'm quite prepared to sit and watch a completely stupid film based on a video game, I'm not expecting the plot to be any good.

The problem was that in the original game, you get rid of your human opponents quickly and then move on to fighting the sand monsters, who are much more interesting. But this never happens in the film. I kept waiting for the sand monsters to appear but they never did.

Other films watched some time after their release - Kick Ass. I enjoyed this. It wasn't as violent as I feared. I'm not keen on gore or horror. However, though I thought it was a good film, I enjoyed the parts where the young girl with purple hair was fighting much better than all the other parts. So I kept thinking 'Where is the girl with purple hair? I want her to come back and start fighting again.' If they were to make another film featuring just her, fighting all the time, I'd like that.

And now, I could do my day's writing shift. Or I could get back to Portal 2. Well, there's only one winner in that competition.

Unexpected Dentistry

I'm still in the grip of Final Fantasy 13, and unable to break free. I'm surprised at my own capacity for doing absolutely nothing except play my Playstation. There's starting to be something epic about it.

I had to go the dentist. Not great, as I still have problems travelling there. (Agoraphobia update: not much progress) But maybe it's not so bad. Perhaps it would break me out of my Playstation obsession and get me back to doing other things. Like writing. Which, I believe, I did do at one time.

Travelled on bus to dentist. Slight toothache. I'm assuming this is just a worn filling needing a little attention. However the dentist deems suspicious as he pokes around in my mouth. He takes an X-Ray. Minutes late he announces that the nerve has to come out right away. So now I'm having unexpected root-canal surgery. A poor time in the dentist's chair follows immediately.  And I was already having a poor time with having to travel. All in all this was not a great experience.

Some time later I limped back out into Brixton and caught a taxi home, not in the best of moods. Have now retreated back to  the Playstation, which is much more agreeable than real life.

A Lack of Productivity

There has been nothing produced in the Millar household for some time now. Writing has ground to a halt along with all other activity. Dishes remain unwashed, email remains unanswered and bills languish unopened on the carpet.

Why is this? Well, it could be because -

A) Scarlett Johansson has finally accepted my invitation to spend a cozy weekend together.

B) I have been engaged in important charity work for the United Nations.

or

C) I've been slumped on the couch night and day, unable to drag myself away from my playstation.

* sigh *

Activity will resume when I finish Final Fantasy 13. This may take some time.

I notice this game had quite a lot of criticism from fans of the series, but I've never played any of the others so I don't know how it compares. I seem to be unable to stop playing it anyway.

Book Cover Humiliation. For Me.

I really liked the Piatkus Cover for Lonely Werewolf Girl. Nice fonts, and a picture giving an indication of what a desperate Kalix MacRinnalch might look like. All in all, a very suitable cover. I'm still keen on it.




Unfortunately, as was soon pointed out to me, Piatkus weren't the only people who liked the cover image. So did the designers who produced this -



Well that seemed bad, two books with the same cover image. By the time anyone realised, it was too late to do anything about it. The books were all printed and on their way to the shops. After making enquiries, my publisher learned that external freelancer who designed the cover had used a royalty-free stock image, unknown to them. That was very unfortunate, but there was nothing to do but accept it and move on. Because after all, it's just one of those things.

Well actually, it now turns out to be just two of those things. Witness the third exhibit -



Yes, here we have a third book, using the same cover image. As Madeline puts it on my Facebook page, epic fail. I must admit to feeling quite humiliated about this. And slightly worried about how many other books might turn up with the same image. It's probably lurking on the desks of other cover designers right now, and they're all about to use it. Soon it will be advertising cornflakes. But perhaps I should actually encourage other publishers to use the picture. We might set some sort of record.

Am now off to slump on the couch and play Final fantasy 13. I didn't intend to buy this game, but at the Supermarket they put it in a rack that was right beside me when I was queuing up to pay for my food. So really they tricked me into buying it. I had no choice. I was powerless to just stand in the queue and not put it in my basket.