Hello everyone!

Some book news to start off with. I managed to order a copy of the complete Averoigne series of stories by Clark Ashton Smith ordered, it 'should' arrive tomorrow. Hopefully, couriers won't wally around too much and it'll actually arrive. The Post Office are still in the midst of strike actions. All the best to them, it's just screwed up deliveries a bit. Hey ho.

I am still working my way through the big stack of books I showed pictures of in a previous post, and I do still intend to do review posts as I finish them. I still have to do review posts of the first issue of New Edge Sword and Sorcery, which I thoroughly enjoyed and will hopefully go on leaps and bounds.

I also want to try and do posts on the Tales from the Magician's Skull magazines, even if I will be operating an issue behind. I most recently received the 7th issue and the 8th is already becoming available in the USA - I live in the UK.

Volume 5 of Swords and Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy has recently come out. I intent to get a copy soon and add it to the pile of 'must reads'. You can get a copy for yourself here.

Swords and Sorceries:
Tales of Heroic Fantasy,
Volume 5

Also, as a surprise, I received My copy of The Beast of Borgenwold by Harry Menear this morning. It was a OSE RPG supplement that I backed on Kickstarter. I wasn't expecting it for a while yet, so that was a nice surprise. I've had little more than a flick through so far so can only say that the artwork in it is great. I'll try and do a review on it soon. But there is a PDF version already available if you link the OSR stuff and have the OSE rules. It should be a fun RPG, I wouldn't have backed it if there wasn't an appeal. But here is a link to DrivethruRPG if you would like a copy of the PDF.

The Beast of Borgenwold,
by Henry Menear
for OSE RPG

Now for some social media stuff. I can now be found on Mastadon at @dancoghlan@mstdn.party and you should be able to use that as a link.

I had also tried to sign up to Hive, because that seems popular for literary types too, but it only seems to have a mobile version and I'm mostly going to be using my laptop for social media uses until I can get a new phone.

I'm also on Facebook with a page you can visit. There is some stuff up there already and I'm intending to update it regularly, like with my twitter and on here. The Facebook page is here. And just as a reminder, here's a link to my Twitter.

Just keep an eye out for the Celtic Elf.

Gwaeloch Irisgarth,
fantasy elf barbarian

Anyway, my writing is probably why you are here. There have been a few ups and downs with settling in with a story. As you have possibly seen if you've followed these posts, I needed a break from writing a fantasy novella that just seemed to grow and grow in size. Now, it's basically looking like it'll become a short novel, weighing in at about fifty thousand words, or there abouts.

I then needed to have a break from it to freshen up the synapses a bit so had wanted to try out Lester Dent's Master Plot Formula. It worked for him and looked like a fun way to write a story. I wanted to see what I could produce using it, so wanted to do a story based on Anglo-Saxon history.

I thought I was very confident with the period after helping out with a YouTube channel homing in on that period, but there where some very specific things I knew little about, so had to go through a research period to iron things out so that I felt confident know what I was talking about.

I was planning to set things just after the Norman Conquest when the aristocracy changed over, but I hadn't quite realised how things had changed during the years building up to the Conquest, how many leaders swapped over, changed sides and lost their loyalties. Even in the village I was planning on basing the story in had three lords holding lands there, all of whom changed three times in the forty years leading up to the Conquest. So there was a lot to take in.

All in all, it felt a bit like a distraction from a distraction from a distraction. I managed to get a third of the way into the story and realised that the research itself was the distraction I needed from the original series of stories.

So, I'm back to that now. There is a short, short story that I'm starting that I've planned out before. I've mentioned it before. It'll act as a way of me getting back into the swing of writing this series after such a long break from it. So soon, I should have a story based on what would happen during a bar-room brawl, if the participants are all wizards. Chaos ensues, I think that will be for sure.

By the end of the week, I should be back to the novella, Gwaeloch the Barbarian Elf should be making his way by sea to a Fomorian village and sorting out a break in the material between universes that fuels magick.

After that, I still want to get in another novella and a short story or two before moving onto editing and that whole process. I realise that I'm sort of doing all this the long way around and having a story published will take a while - I already have a novella and three short stories completed in first draft form that I will be getting around to.

Regardless of this, I still have a good layout for a set of Anglo-Saxon sword and Sorcery stories, though I am still puzzling over whether I should add a Lovecraftian element to them. But I have the ground work laid for that to return to. 

Anyway, that's pretty much all I have to say for this week, my Anglo-Saxon stuff is on hold while I return to the original stories I was writing, so hopefully, something will be finished soon.

All that remains to be said is to wish you all a fond farewell, good bye everyone.

 Hello everyone!

A few things first, some social media housekeeping stuff in essence, but I've been talking note of some of the things that have been happening on Twitter - some of those obvious things - and all the folks that seem to be jumping ship.

Because of that, I now have a Mastadon profile. So now, you can find me there on @dancoghlan@mstdn.party and you can press it. It should be a link to my account. I'm still using Twitter, which you should be able to do here if you search for Dan Coghlan. I'm not planning on leaving Twitter any time soon. I'm planning on riding it out and seeing what happens, depending on what the behind the scenes changes bring.

I also, now have a facebook page and plan to be quite active on there too. I realise I should really have had a Facebook page for quite a while now, but hay ho, I have one now. And that should be found here - if you search for Dan Coghlan - author.

Yes, I like Twitter, I like it a lot, but with all the folks leaving and with all the changes, it have become worrisome. So, regardless, please take a look and see what suits. You're all welcome to come and react with me on a platform that your comfortable with. Just look for the tartan elf with a broadsword.

Gwaeloch Irisgarth,
Celtic Elf barbarian

And writing this, I now realise that I will probably have to update the introductory title page and a couple of bits on some of the pages of this very blog. But I'll get to that in time.

But onto a few other things.

I've really got into a game called The Woods made by Oakbound Studio. I think I've talked about it before. I know I've shared some stuff by Oakbound Studio before, but I just wanted to mention it once again. I've been very impressed by it. Please take a look with the link above.

The Woods by Oakbound Studio,
Skirmish Game

I have also been sorely tempted by collecting an Aeldari/Eldar army for Warhammer 40k. I've a bit of a mixed opinion about the company, but the game generally is entertaining. I'm sort of trying to subdue that temptation until after Christmas when I can actually start planning that responsibly, instead of racing into it and getting too excited about it.

This is unfortunate, I'm still eyeing up The Barons' War game too. There are some really nice models there done by Footsore Miniatures, who also do Saga.

Baron's War
by Footsore Miniatures
A Medieval Skirmish Game

Now onto my writing, which is probably what you're all here for mainly.

Finally, and I mean, finally! I've finished research to a place where I feel comfortable AND I've managed to get all the character profiles and notes sorted and now I feel comfortably prepared enough to actually start writing.

There is a story I want to write that involves the aftermath of the Norman Conquest and the opening days of the Harrying of the North.

As you can imagine, there is a lot going on with all that. I'd already had a familiarity with the period and knew of several locations that were suitable for the story and thought - quite a while ago - that I was familiar enough with the history and the location enough to be able to start writing.

But that wasn't the case. It turns out that Anglo-Saxon history is a lot like Game of Thrones but with a lot more stabbing going on. I realised that I was only familiar with the little more than the tip of that iceberg and one of the problems is that the village I'd thought most suitable as a setting didn't have one lord... not even two lords. The village had three lords. And each of them had changed and been replaced intermittently. Trying to keep track of who was who, where their manor actually was and their motivations and opinions of each other was quite stressful. There was also the problem of fitting all that into a wider picture as well, which caused problems. But everything is ironed out now. I have a decent story plan to follow now and know what I'm doing with it all.

There are even the options for this to be the start of a series of partly interlinked stories too. I'm even thinking that there could be a supernatural/spooky prequel story as the area has barrows, a cursor and the remains of a stone circle. It feels a shame to utterly ignore those so it'd be rude not to involve them somehow.

Anyway, that's what I've been up to. Tonight, I'll be concentrating on starting the short story and seeing how far I get. I'm really relieved that I've finally finished all the research to a good level and can now actually start.

Finally, I bid you all a farewell and invite you to look at the above links. I hope to see you all soon.

 Hi everyone!

I recently got a bit of a book haul and I thought I'd show it off a bit.

First off is a trio of books I've got from a fantasy author called Charles Moffat. I've been meaning to get some of his work for a while and I'm not fully sure why its taken so long for me to actually invest in his books. He's a self published author and his work can be found on Amazon. He's written a good selection of books to choose from already.

I managed to get Wulfric the Wanderer: Black Monoliths of Al-Kazar and The Adventures of Wrathgar: The Sunken Castle by Charles Moffat and they're stand alone novellas, while I also have a collection of Lilith Bloodstone stories in the omnibus. They should be enjoyable and all are set in the same world of Korovia, that Charles Moffat has built. I've had a read of the first few pages of The Sunken City in my excitement and its enjoyable enough at the moment, but of course, I'm not in a position to make any actual comment on them yet.

A trio of books in the Korovia series
by Charles Moffat

Next up is a selection from DMR Books. These are off Amazon as well. I live in England, but ideally I would have got them off the DMR Books website, but it looks like they don't ship over seas anymore - at this time - because of some mishaps that have occurred during transit. Apparently, things have gotten lost. Anyone interested in they're books that live in america should still be able to purchase them from their website if they wish.

In this, Death Dealers and Diabolists has a good selection of stories and one by Keith Taylor of Bard fame. I've read one of the Bard tales before in Samhain Sorceries - also by DMR Books - and was suitably impressed. 

Heroes of Atlantis and Lemuria has a number of stories by Manly Wade Wellman and Frederick Arnold Kummer Jr, and also a story finishing it off by Leigh Brackett who penned Jirel of Joiry.

There is also Wulfhere, by A B Higginson, which is set during Anglo-Saxon ruled Britain and was originally serialised in Adventure Magazine in 1920, and hadn't been published since. I've already started reading this in bed.

In the photo, there is also a book that is, as far as I know, out of print and which I didn't get from DMR Books. Redbeard by Michael Resnick is a tale from and is a tale of a mutant barbarian from a dystopian future, written in 1969.

Redbeard by Michael Resnick
plus three anthologies by DMR Books

Up next are a trio of anthologies edited by Nathaniel Webb. Rakehell is a collection of swashbuckling pieces that look suitably rip-roaring. Wyngraf Volumes 1 and 2 are advertised as cozy fantasy. These all came recommended to me and I'm really looking forward to reading them. I'm curious to find out just how cozy is cozy fantasy. Now that the winter months are settling in, this sounds very pleasant.

Rakehell Magazine and Wyngraf issues

Next is Strawjack by Keith Page, which I bought as a recommendation from Amazon. I've had a flick through because I was curious to find that it was an A4 book and I found that it was a self-published graphic-novel. 

I'd bought it under the presumption that it was another novella, but I was wrong, and pleasantly surprised. It does look very entertaining. Its a tale of Georgian highwaymen in the vein of Reverend Syn. It should be enjoyable, even if it I wasn't expecting it. That'll teach me to actually read the product description better.

Strawjack by Keith Page

Another book I got off Amazon is The Averoigne Legacy by Pickman's Press. Its a collection - quick a large collection - of poems and tales based on the Averoigne setting that Ashton Clark Smith came up with, I have ordered the collected Averoigne tales by Clark Ashton Smith, but I got that off Ebay and it hasn't arrived just yet.

I have started reading this and I'm thoroughly impressed by Brian McNaughton's The Return of the Colossus. But more on that when I do a review. There must be about 35 tales and poems in this volume.

I'm familiar with Clark Ashton Smith's work, but its been a while since I read any of his work and of those stories I've read, only a small few must have been set in Averoigne, but I remember them most vividly. Clark Ashton Smith was one of those that was a pen pal of HP Lovecraft, Robert E Howard and Robert Bloch, so I'm looking forward to finishing this volume and the collection of Clark Ashton Smith's own tales set in the dark woods of Averoigne. I think I have also, many years ago, read Lovecraft inspired tales published in anthologies by Pickman's Press before, but its hard to tell. Some of the layout and writing style feels familiar, but its been years since I've even held those volumes.

Averoigne Legacy, based on the work of
Clark Ashton Smith

Anyway, that's it for now. I'll hopefully review these books properly once I've finished them. And also, I'll get to including some other books I have that I think are of interest. There are a few RPG books I'd like to review on here too, some of which I got from kickstarters.

But I think those are for another time.

Needless to say, I am still trucking on with getting stories sorted. I'm currently working on a story or two that were originally mean to be refresher stories and a break from a novella that I was writing. I needed a break from the novella because it was browing in size and getting out of hand, and now, the stories I'm doing to take a break are themselves getting out of hand. Who'd have thought that there'd have been so much backstabbing and treachery and war in Anglo-Saxon England hey? It puts Game of Thrones to shame.

 Hello everyone!

Well, to start off with, just to get things out of the way. As of writing this post, The Dreamstone TTRPG supplement by Oakbound Studio is into its last day on kickstarter, so I'd like to sort of encourage you to go and take a look. Which you can do so here.

I know that Oakbound Studios has worked really hard on it so please take a bit of a look.

The Dreamstone RPG by Oakbound Studio

But onto other stuff. I managed to get a little bit of money in the meantime, since my last post, so I've been on a bit of a spending spree and have ordered a stack of books. Hopefully they'll be delivered on Tuesday. Hopefully.

Once they're delivered, I hope to do an unboxing post. A number of the books have been recommended to me by folks that can spot a good book a mile off. So, there's that.

I've also seriously been eyeing up a game called Baron's War, which is, unsurprisingly based on the Barons' War, where King John had continued to muck around after the signing of the Magna Carta to the point that there was a war. Then a couple of decades later, similar things happened. I've just been eyeing up their Welsh models and they look particularly splendid. But yes, this skirmish game has plenty of knights and kings and men-at-arms and the like.

The Barons' War skirmish game,
by Footsore Miniatures

Foot knights for The Barons' War skirmish game,
by Footsore Miniatures

But life has got in the way a little bit over this last week. There have been some ups and downs and a few distractions so, unfortunately, I've not managed to get to much writing done.

But much research has happened. Though I was hoping that the story I'm researching would be a break from another piece of writing, this seems to have developed into a potential project all in itself.

As you may have noticed with an earlier post, I've been researching late Anglo-Saxon history. I had initially thought that it would take a day or so to buff up on a few facts, but I've gone down a huge rabbit hole, realising quite how action packed it is. And that's without any full on invasions or crusades, which seemed popular in that period.

I tried cutting down on some of the research by thinking of basing the story in the village I grew up in, but realised that I'd made things hard for myself in the sense that, instead of the village having one lord to keep tabs on... there are three. And that's without several of them being deposed by the ruler for allying with his enemies. But that does mean that the character's past has a lot of backstabbing in his history. Which can be a fun thing.

and this was all for a story based on a Lovecraftian horror and the beginning of the Harrying of the North. Oh well. But needless to say, I think that's why I think this could be a series of stories.

I think I'm almost ready to actually start writing. Maybe this evening.

I didn't even get a chance to look up the history of The Isle of Mann.

 Hello everyone!

It looks like its a day where I do two posts. I don't think I've done that yet. The previous post was about some sad news in the graphic novel and comic industry. Its a shame that Kevin O'Neill has died. He was as old as my dad and had also been the illustrator for some of the earliest graphic novels and comics I'd read, beyond the obligatory Asterixes, Tintins, Beanos and Dandys.

But onto some other things.

What started out as a break from my fantasy novella involving an elf barbarian and his adventures to Fomori lands with a wizard because of strange gods, I wanted to write something that I could use the Lester Dent Mast Formula on. I wanted to give it a go, see if it was a fun way of writing and if the story would be any good. Well, I've not started it yet, even after a week.

Lester Dent of Doc Savage fame

I might do an article on the Lester Dent Master Formula, or a couple, one explaining what it is and another as a sort of review perhaps, but regardless, this last week, I seem to have gone done a rabbit hole of Anglo Saxon history.

It started out as an attempt to buff up on some local history. I was also familiar with the time period so thought it would be an easy enough fit to getting a story started. But no.

The villages that I wanted to base the story in never quite fitted because the lordship of the place would be taken over by a Norman lord who wasn't really present, so I decided to base the story in the village I grew up in.

With decades of first hand experience of the place, writing a story on the place should be easy, yes? No, the village, at the time, was run by three separate lords, only one of which was present.

You can fit the story around all the politics involved in that can't you? Maybe, but I've had to learn about a fair amount of Anglo-Saxon law and land demarcation, as well as with the three sets of lords that constantly change, and with armies being raised in the area.

It doesn't help that parts of the land were held by the king, who conveniently kept changing every so often because politics likes to poison or stab their kings, and also with ever changing list of Earls who held the lands. One of whom was Leofric of Mercia, who was married to Lady Godiva. Another was Aelfgar of Mercia. Both of which had trouble with the Vikings. Then before that there was a Morcar who got stabbed by an agent of Aethelred the Unready, who previously have made him fairly autonomous in the area who later got stabbed for being a traitor.

Aethelred the Unready

Earl Leofric of Mercia with
Lady Godiva

Lady Godiva

Earl Leofric in The Last Kingdom

That's not forgetting that there was another Morcar, who became Earl of Northumbria because he sorted out civil unrest, but was only Earl for a year. He led an army raised in the area with his Brother, Edwin, who became Earl of Mercia. But there was a gap of about four years before he took up the title from his father, Aelfgar, who in turn became Earl of Mercia twice, Earl of East Anglia twice and was exiled at one point to France - where a lot of exiled Mercians seem to go. exiled Northumbrians seem to come to Mercia for some reason.

Earl Edwin of Mercia

Earl Edwin of Mercia

Earl Morcar of Northumbria

Earl Morcar of Northumbria

Earl Edwin of Mercia and
Earl Morcar of Northumbria

But part of the problem with all of that is, I was sort of hoping to make my character an illegitimate son of one of the Earls, but none seem to have been in the area at the right time to have sired a bastard son, despite all the convoluted stuff that would put Game of Thrones to shame.

With there being a sub-manor in the village of Aston on Trent, I thought I could have the lord of that - Uctebrand - as the main character. Maybe. But at the time I want my hero to be active, he'll be in his early 50s, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but he's been such a loyal farmer for his entire life, I am really struggling to see him take up the mantle of a sword and sorcery hero.

All Saints, part Saxon church, Aston on Trent

As Uctebrand is virtually unheard of - even his name is uncommon in the history books as there were only ever four people in the books to have ever been called Uctebrand - it could be possibly that he had a bastard son of his very own, maybe I'll try and work something out with that.

But struth, that feels like its been a long and arduous journey. I described it to a friend as being as if you looked at all the stabbings and dragons in the Games of Thrones, replaced the dragons with more stabbings, added a few more stabs as sprinkles on top and then washed it down with a nice warm mug of stabbings.

Anyway, hopefully I'll have deciphered something useful from all this and will have actually have made headway into a story by the time I write another blog post.

I'll see you all next week.

 Hi everyone!

I sat down to write a weekly update post and just as I did, found that Kevin O'Neil had died.

If you're unfamiliar with his work, you can find out more about him here. I fondly remember his work with Alan Moore and it was only in later life that I got into comics and graphic novels and some of the first I got were the first volumes of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and a little while after, I found his Marshal Law strips. 2000AD was always a staple for those early days and his work for Nemesis the Warlock and other story lines is held in high regard.

He was born in 1953, the same year as my dad and died today from undisclosed reasons. I'll sorely miss him.

League of Extraordinary Gentlemen,
Kevin O'Neill

Nemesis the Warlock, Kevin O'Neill

Marshal Law, Kevin O'Neill

 Hello everyone!

Just a quick post.

I wanted to let everyone be aware of a really cool RPG from a small company called Oakbound Studio. They have a few really cool games out there, one involving a post apocalyptic setting and another, with super cool Oldhammer/old-school style figures called The Woods, based on Celtic Myths and Legends, with a bit of Terry Pratchett, Brian Froud and The Labyrinth thrown in for good measure.

But the company has released a Kickstarter for a RPG based on a cult British cartoon from the early '90s called The Dreamstone which was shown in on CITV - part of ITV. This is a supplement for the game. Which can be found here.

If you find that appealing, you can check out the Oakbound Studio website and take a look at the rules sets and already existing miniatures.

The Dreamstone cartoon