House: About That

After much scrabbling about to find the couple of thousand dollars to secure it, we signed the lease on a new house this morning. The market being what it is, we're paying the same as this old place for a much smaller home, and we'll be flat broke for weeks while we recover from the expense of moving, but hey - we won't be living in a cardboard box come October 2.

Thanks to those of you who emailed or posted here with your support, and in the case of one friend who really can't afford it, an offer of money towards the deposit - you know who you are, special thanks to you!

So aside from the continued crating up of everything we own and the inevitable two-week loss of TV/Internet/Various Valuable Documents post-move, it should be business as usual very soon. In the meantime, a quick round-up of what's been going on in the background.

The first reviews of Transmissions have started to appear, and I'm exceedingly pleased to say they're very positive. Those of you with access to the Doctor Who Forum can check out what forum member Styre had to say in the Transmissions Discussion Thread. I won't go into details, because there are some spoilers in there for anyone who's not read the stores yet, but overall he like.

Meanwhile Sci-Fi Online has got its review up too - similarly good, if a bit bizarre (the reviewer appears to love the book, then awards it 6/10 ...). That one's more or less spoiler-free, so view with abandon.

I managed to read the book myself in amongst everything else, and all bias aside it is rather good - top job by editor Richard Salter who deserves another commission quick-smart. My picks for top tales? Hard pressed to choose between Ian Mond's Policy to Invade, a cleverly constructed tale that plays to the show's strengths - large-scale sci-fi that doesn't neglect the small-scale emotional heart; Lonely, a deceptively simple but thoroughly creepy spin on internet chatrooms by Richard Wright; and iNtRUsioNs by Dave Hoskin which I can't really get into without spoiling it.

Enough glad-handing. Go grab a copy and see for yourself.




In other news, Voices is now available for pre-order. I was amused to see the cover blurb on editor Amanda Pillar's site tagging the contributors as 'master storytellers' - that kept my ego stoked for a few days ... and it also reminds me, quick shout out to Amanda, who's been very understanding about a submission I'm working on and how the housing crisis has led to its temporary derailing. Good news - with that sorted out now, I should still be done on time. Woo-hoo!

I've also fired off a testing-of-the-water email to a company concerning a new(ish) range of stories they're putting out. So far the expected utter silence, but in fairness if I'd had a reply I'd not have been able to do very much about it until now anyway. Ho hum.

And last but not least, a magazine story I've been trying to get off the ground since April has final shown a spark of life. It's become a small obsession, seeing it through - one way or another it'll be done by the start of November. Hooray.

There you go then. Nothing for weeks, then a novella's worth in one post. I hope it won't take so long next time ...