I Have a Book!!!!1!!!!!!11one!!

It’s been a while since I updated this dusty site, but not for lack of interest. Rather, I’ve been up to my neck in writing projects…which should (hopefully) be trickling out over the next months (and years, perhaps).

To wit, my first novel To Chart the Clouds is now available in eBook, Paperback, and Audiobook!

I’ve had the incredible opportunity to have a couple of interviews and chats about the novel, so I won’t repeat the same things here; except to say how incredibly grateful I am to have an editor and publisher willing to indulge my academic and fantastical literary predilections.

I’ve been fascinated with Japan since middle school, when my friend dragged me to an Akira Kurosawa film festival at the local college. Neither historical films nor anime were readily accessible in the mid-90s, so I had to scrabble for all the bootleg dubs and Toonami reruns I could find.

My interest led me to study Japanese in undergrad, then to grad school, where I studied the development of cartography in non-western societies (specifically Japan). A lot of that threaded To Chart the Clouds, although hopefully it’s a bit less dry than my thesis.

My first Legend of the Five Rings RPG book was the 2^nd edition players guide. I found it at a used books store in the bargain bin, and for good reason—someone had torn off the back cover and colored over many of the illustrations with permanent marker. Still, the text was (mostly) legible, and that was good enough for me.

The first time I actually went to Japan was in the early 2000’s. This was right about when the Clan War series came out. I remember having to leave a sweater and pair of pants at home because I wanted to make sure to bring EVERY BOOK IN THE SERIES. Reading L5R, in JAPAN?! I couldn’t imagine anything cooler.

Twenty years later, I’m still reading L5R. Although I haven’t had much opportunity to actually play the game, I have a pretty respectable collection of RPG books ranging from second edition (alas, my old Player’s Guide finally fell apart in the mid-aughts) to the most current FFG books. This isn’t meant to establish my bona fides—I consider myself more of an amateur historian where L5R lore is concerned; but rather to show how lucky I’ve been to have the opportunity to write in a world that has given me so much enjoyment over the years.

Even now, I still can’t quite believe it.

Periodically, I take a copy of To Chart the Clouds down from my bookshelf and just hold it. Mostly to assure myself it’s real, that I actually wrote it, and it actually got published. There really aren’t words to describe how simultaneously delightful and humbling it is; not to mention how grateful I am that both my editor and Aconyte took a chance on a quirky novel about Rokugani cartography.