The Impaler's Revenge is available now!

The Impaler's Revenge (The Impaler Legacy #1), the vampire novella I kept telling you about, is now available through Amazon and Smashwords and soon it will be available on other on-line stores too.

In the fall of 2011, I got sick with a bad cold and for a week, I was unable to do anything beside reading. I knew from the start that it was going to be a long recovery so I picked a series that was supposed to keep me busy for a while. It happened to deal with vampires.

While I enjoy my fanged friends like anyone else, I’m more than a little offended to see everyone associating them with Transylvania and especially Vlad Ţepeş. Thank you, Mr. Stoker! Not. I guess my issue with vampires started back in my childhood when I was recovering after a surgery in France. The physical therapist came to check on me, and seeing that I was having a transfusion, he quipped, “Oh, you’re from Romania. I see you’re having breakfast,” and pointed at the blood bag. I was this close to reply “Yeah, and you’re next!”

This put aside, after finishing reading the series, I started thinking about how I would write a vampire story, considering that I had never written anything of that sort. And you know, someone had to defend Ţepeş’s honor. He used to be a great king, even if a strict one, and people had turned him into such a joke. I plotted the story over the summer and wrote it the following fall. So this is my answer to all the vampire stories out there, ‘a story like no other’ as the tagline says.

The novella comes accompanied by a bonus story Sweet Surrender (The Impaler Legacy #1.5) that is only available on my website.

When I finished writing the first draft of The Impaler’s Revenge, I had no plans for a sequel, but I was not ready to let go of the characters yet. I had spent half a year socializing with them and becoming close friends so as I typed ‘The End’ I was already starting to miss them. But it turned out it didn’t have to be the end of our adventures together. 

After finishing reading the draft, a friend told me “You have to write what happened between Liana and Jesse. You can’t leave it like that! You’ve tortured them enough.” I whined about how it would be just fluff and no one would be interested in reading it, and the reaction was “Just write it already!” 

So the next Friday, I sat down at the computer and realized that it wasn’t just fluff like I had feared, there were real issues that needed to be discussed. I finished the story in one sitting and, when I was done, my first thought was “Damn! Now I need to find out what happened in New Zealand!”

For those of you worrying about starting a new series,  know that I have the first draft of the second novella written down and I'm already plotting the third one. Hopefully, the entire series will be published by the end of the year.

I hope you'll like my own version of vampire stories. Check out the purchase links at the top of the post and in the right side bar. Enjoy! 

Eurocon 2013 Encouragement Award

I'm proud to announce that I'm one of the receivers of Encouragement Award given by the European Science Fiction Society at Eurocon 2013.

See the full list of winners here.

So I guess it's time to add "award-winning writer" to my author bio.

"Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" First Review

The first review of "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" showed up online on Fan SF blog. Liviu has good things to say about the book.

I've only managed to read the first eight stories yesterday, but I tend to agree. Now the cat looks at me like she's about to ask for punitive damages. I must have traumatized her last night.

"Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" can be ordered here.

The Impaler's Revenge Excerpt

The Easter bunny has arrived early this year! I decided it was time to give you taste of The Impaler's Revenge, so over the weekend I'll post each day a part for your enjoyment.

Here's the description if you need to refresh your memory:

"In a world crawling with vampires, Romania is the safest place left on earth. Thanks to the Little Council, there hasn't been a vampire on Romanian ground in over five centuries. But one day, Liana Cantacuzino, also a member of the Little Council and a descendant of one of the old noble families, is ordered to bring one in, covertly. Enter Maximilien Hess, a thousand years old vampire determined to ruin the existing order of things.

Suddenly, Liana finds herself forced to protect Hess, instead of having the pandurs kill him. With the help from her trustful friends, Rodica Ghica and Ştefan Sturdza, and that of an innocent bystander, Dr. Jesse Carver, Liana has to find out what is going on and what the President is hiding from her. When all is revealed, Hess's secret changes everything.

The first novella in The Impaler Legacy series, a vampire saga like no other."

And here is the first part. 

Update: Part two added. 

2nd Update: Part three also added.

Two stories and one interview in Revista de Suspans

I've been wanting to write a story for Revista de Suspans (Suspense Magazine) ever since its launch last fall. With other magazines, unless they pay, I'm usually like "okay, let's give it a couple of months and see how it fares, and then maybe I'll write something for it." It wasn't the case here as I was already familiar with Mircea Pricajan's work from Suspans.ro, so it was only a matter of time for finding the time to write the story and, of course, finding the right idea for it. It looks like the waiting paid off because in the April issue of Revista de Suspans you'll find not just one story but two plus an interview featuring... me.

1. "Iluminare" (Illumination) - Romanian short story written especially for Revista de Suspense. Initially, the story was supposed to include more fantasy elements, but sometimes what you write on the paper (or in this case type) comes out a little differently than what you have planned. After the first draft was done, I considered re-writing the story to get it back on the right track, but then it risked turning out too much like Howgarts, and I kind of liked it the way it was. Besides, I don't write only sci fi and fantasy, I write suspense and adventure too, and oh, you should read my spicy romance, tee-hee!

2. "The Chase" - English short story, included in "Blue Moon Cafe Series: Where Shifters Meet for Drinks". If you like it and want to read more stories set in the same universe, you can get the short story collection here or check out the various links at the right.

3. Interview - It's about "Zombii: Cartea mortilor vii" (Zombies: The Book of the Living Dead), and it features most of the authors included in the anthology (you can order the book here). While reading it, I noticed that my answers are the shortest so if you really want to know how this writer's mind works I guess you'll have to read my stories. *grins* Oh, and check out Roxana's Brinceanu's answer no. 6. It gave me quite a giggle!

2013 March Reading List

The Black Company by Glen Cook – It took me about half of the book to really get into it, and it still wasn’t my cup of tea. It read too much like a bad video game from the 90s. 3/5 stars 

The Wheel of Time 1: The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan – To summarize it all: run, hide, camp, run, sing, juggle, spend the night in an inn, fight, run… repeat again and again for all 700+ pages. Meh. 4/5 stars 

Efectul de nautil (The Nautilus Effect) by Ioana Visan – Yes, I had to read my own book over the weekend to make sure everything was in order before sending it to be printed. I was quite happy with the result if you ask me! :D 

The United States of McSweeney's (the version published by Nemira so not sure exactly what’s the English edition) – Strange. I don’t know what I was expecting but, while most of the stories are well-written, I didn’t quite care for any of them. 3/5 stars 

The Prefect by Alastair Reynolds – A bit cold and distant, but the plot was quite well done. 4/5 stars 

Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare – The constant change of POV was nauseating, the avalanche of letters, quotes, and songs was annoying, and I hated the ending. Quite a frustrating book, but at least the series has ended, thank God for that! 3/5 stars 

Gardens of the Moon by Steven Erikson – I gave up on it after reading over a quarter of the book. There’s no way of telling the characters apart, no background, only battle and scheming, and even that not done well. Pah!

I think I'm done with fantasy series for a while. I've started (as in read the first book or at least tried to) like six series since last fall, and the only one I fully enjoyed was the Mistborn. I'm ready for some sci fi now!

Story: "O familie de sclipicioşi"

My story "O familie de sclipicioşi" (A Sparkling Family) can be read in the 30th issue of  Helion Online (March-April 2013). This story won the 2nd place at the Helion 2012 writing contest, and considering that the first place was not awarded and who the competition was, I'm quite happy with the result.

It's also included in my short story collection "Efectul de nautil" (The Nautilus Effect). If you like printed books, you can order it here.

Update: I just noticed now on the front page of Helion Online that the story was scheduled for the March 22 session of Helion Club. I'm not sure exactly what this mean. Did they read it, discussed it or what? Can someone who was there enlighten me?

Evolution: Vol. 2 on Sale

This weekend, March 30-31, you can buy Evolution: Vol. 2 for only $0.99 on Amazon. It includes my short story "Beneath the Skin".

Evolved Publishing put a whole bunch of books on sale so check the full listing here. You might find something else you like.

Argos, no. 1, April 2013

The first issue of Argos magazine is available as an ebook on elefant.ro.

It includes my story "Un zambet de milioane" (A Smile Worth Millions) that won the AtelierKult contest last year, so don't miss it.

It only costs 4.99 RON.

And it's already in top 3 of best sold digital books, yay!

"Efectul de nautil" and "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" Book Launch

Well, I wasn't there, but people kept telling me that the book launch went very well, and now we have proofs too.

Here are photos from "Efectul de nautil" book launch and photos from Final Frontier book fair in general courtesy of Assassin CG.

And here are videos from the launch courtesy of the same Assassin: part 1 and part 2.

The speakers were Horia Ursu from Millennium Books and Mircea Naidin. I thank them both for the nice presentation.

Lessons to be learned for upcoming writers: 1) make sure to have a well-organized website so people can find information about you; 2) be careful what you say in the interviews because you never know when you will be quoted next. :)

The launch of "Zombii. Cartea mortilor vii" took place during the same panel, right after my launch, and we have videos from that too: part 1 and part 2.

The speakers were Mircea Pricajan (the editor of the book) and Mihai Adascalitei from Dark Wolf's Fantasy Reviews.

One small correction I have to make as they discussed at some point how many of the authors are from Transylvania. I just happen to be born in Moldavia and live here, but my dad is from Vallachia and my mom is from Transylvania where I spent a big part of my childhood, so I consider myself to be Transylvanian. :)

As far as I am concerned, Assassin is the star of the day because he filmed the whole thing!

Now that we've had the book launch(es), the book(s) should be in the stores soon. If you can't wait, you can order them here.

Update: Catalin Badea-Gheracostea talks about Final Frontier and "Efectul de nautil" in his article from Observator cultural.

2nd update: And here is an article about the event on Galileo Online.