I’m sending this email out in the middle of the week because Shadows of the Past is on sale through tomorrow. You can pick it up for .99 cents wherever fine ebooks are sold.

My favorite store is mine, right here. You can get all my books, in all available formats, directly from me. But, if you prefer another e-shop, here’s a complete listing of every online store that has it.

An Interview

Last Friday I sat for an interview with Writers With Purpose. You can watch the discussion over here on YouTube.

It was a great opportunity to explain the Great War of the Worlds and where the idea for the series came from. At the same time, I realized that many of the newer subscribers to this newsletter aren't familiar with the origins of the series. So, here's a quick review.

H.G Wells' War of the Worlds ends with the Martian invaders succumbing to Earth's microbes: they dropped dead from the common cold. This story, which I first encountered in Classics Illustrated as a kid, left me with two questions.

First, did all the Martians really die? People react differently to viral and bacterial infections. Do aliens? Were some merely left debilitated and did they have the wherewithal to hide and plan a second offensive? What did the Martians back on Mars do? Were they monitoring the invasion? Did they come up with a new strategy?

Second… Now what? Look at how World War II and 9/11 changed the world. What would the impact of an alien invasion be? Especially in the 1890s, when Germany's Kaiser and Russia's Tzar Nicholas were active and the United States was still a sleeping giant?

These ideas were still rattling around in the back of my mind when I started research for a book about my grandfather. He had a hell of a life.

The German Army drafted him as a young man. He went to war and fought in the brutal Battle of the Somme, where he became an accidental hero. Later, the Fench captured him, and he eventually returned to a Germany that quickly became engulfed in the chaos of the Weimar Era. In 1929, he fled the United States after tangling with fascists in his hometown. (My aunt implied he was involved in that 1925 shooting.)

My grandfather's story felt too big for me to take on as a first book. (Honestly, it still feels like too much now, after writing three.) But as I was sitting in a research room in the New York Public Library, I had another idea. What if Wells' Martians showed up on the Somme? And what series of events might make that happen? What would the Battle of Somme look like in a post-Invasion world? And, of course, how would the United States have reacted to an alien invasion?

I dove in, and here we are three books later. I’m not done with the series, although I’m taking a break to start another.

I wrote more about the origin of the Great War of the Worlds in a series of posts in 2023. You can read them here, here, and here.

And, of course, you can watch the interview here.

More Free Science Fiction and Fantasy

I mentioned Beasts in the Garden by C. Gockel a few newsletters back. It's the first book in a series that will wrap up in July. The second book took the series to a new world and I am eagerly awaiting the third.

What does this have to do with free books?

Well, C. Gockel organized a free book giveaway this month and I'm fortunate enough to be part of it! You can get one of her short stories, along with an enormous selection of other great tales!

Check out these great reads over here!