Blog

(PM minis created by Loey on Gaia)

I am a fortunate man, for I am surrounded by wonderful people. My friends and family are jewels, and my baby is an incredible joy.

If that was the extent of my good fortune, as my Jewish friends say, Dayenu. It would have been enough.

But I haven’t even mentioned my readers. My precious, precious readers, who have not only made me a bestseller in multiple languages, not only written amazing poetry based on my work, but some of them go above and beyond the call of duty and even make fan art.

Take 17 year old Phil from the UK, who was inspired after reading The Painted Man to create this image:

There’s also 18 year old Iris from Germany, who loved Das Lied der Dunkelheit so much that she made her own ward grimoire by customizing a leather notebook. Check this out. It’s amazing:

Not to be outdone, we have 22 year old Nic from the UK, who, after finishing The Painted Man, decided to create an image of The Painted Man fighting wood demons for a Good vs Evil art competition on one of the greatest sites on the web, deviantART.

How cool is this?

I love how the wood demon (with those crazy branchlike claws!) is only half-formed from the mist, and the soft glow of the wards on The Painted Man’s skin. And check out the expression on his face. That demon is going to get his ass kicked, but good.

Things like this thrill me beyond words. The inspiration I drew from comics and fantasy novels as a child led me to create many pieces of fan art myself, and cemented my decision to be an author myself one day.The very idea that my own work is inspiring others in the same way is mind-blowing, and when I see results like these, I have a full on geek attack. It’s an incredible honor.

These pics, and others, will appear permanently in the Fan Art section of my Creations page, once I finish all the code.

Posted on June 27, 2009 at 2:39 pm by PeatB
Filed under Fans, Musings, Writing
6 Comments »

At long last, I am pleased to announce the news that The Great Bazaar, and Other Stories has been sold to Subterranean Press. The Great Bazaar is a back up story I wrote for the forthcoming UK deluxe version of The Painted Man from Voyager Books. Essentially chapter 16.5 of The Warded/Painted Man, this story takes place in the three year gap between Arlen’s leaving Fort Miln and his searching the ruins of Anoch Sun. I think of those three years as an adventure filled period in Arlen’s life, filled with exciting stories. The Great Bazaar is the first of these, and one that I had planned long ago, showing how Arlen found the lost city in the first place.

The Great Bazaar was designed to be an introduction to Arlen and his world for new readers, as well as filling in a gap in the first book for people who have already read and enjoyed The Warded Man. It also takes place in Fort Krasia, and will be a wonderful appetizer for the sequel, The Desert Spear, due in April 2010.

The Great Bazaar and Other Stories will be published as a limited edition pocket-sized hardcover book released in early 2010 (well prior to The Desert Spear), containing the 14,000 word GB novelette, plus an additional 6,000 words of introductions, deleted scenes and supplemental materials. It will be printed in a run of 1,000 copies, with an additional 250 copies signed and numbered by yours truly.

I can’t wait!

Posted on June 25, 2009 at 11:34 am by PeatB
Filed under Craft, Desert Spear, Events, Great Bazaar, Sales, Writing
8 Comments »

Words fail me when I try to describe how awesome the Haiku Review contest was. Even reading through the entries again just now I found myself laughing put loud, shaking my head in amazement, and looking up cool words like “revenant” (which I, as a SF writer, have absolutely no excuse for not knowing).

I know it sounds trite, but this is a time when I wish everyone could be a winner, and that I had an endless stream of goodies to give out and could send a gift to every contributor. I’m only going to mention a handful of the dozens of poems submitted, but they are all wonderful, each in their own way. I want to thank everyone who took the time to  submit. Each one is a joy I’ll cherish forever.

Alas, my little stash of neato Warded Man swag is somewhat limited at the moment, and I want to save some of it for more contests like this one. Even so, I’ve decided to up the # of prize-winners from two to four. Just cuz.

So, without further ado…

Honorable Mentions (no prize):

The sun is falling
The corelings are stirring
The wards are intact

Posted by Karen Mottola

I really like this poem by Karen Mottola. It is stark and beautiful and would have been a serious contender, but alas, line 2 has 6 syllables instead of 7.

Corelings rise at night
Safety lies behind the wards
Freedom lies outside

Posted by Jennifer

In all honesty, this poem is quite possibly my favorite of all. It sums up Arlen’s plight and path beautifully, wasting no words at all. It’s a poem that really shows the power of the Haiku. This was the tweet of its day. All the folks on Twitter are just a bunch of crude amateur Johnny Come Latelys to the art form.

So why didn’t this one get a prize? Well, full disclosure, Jennifer and I have known each other since first grade, and she’s one of my closest friends who’s been listening to me talk about Arlen since before the Towers fell. Like my buddies Matt and Myke, she felt this gave her an unfair advantage, and should disqualify her from winning a prize, so she’s recused herself.

Still, good fucking poem, right?

Fourth Prize (Japanese Painted Man 1st edition book #2, autographed):

A guy fights demons
Using magical tattoos
Hell’s angel, indeed

Peeling arcs of paint
Shifting sand obscures a line
The wards are failing

Corelings take the wall
One-Arm brings granite chaos
The guards fall like rain

Centuries of fear
The tide is turned by a man
Not afraid to fight

Posted by Carrie Harris

Of course, this whole contest is Carrie’s fault. She’s been reviewing books in haiku now for…

Well, I don’t really know how long she’s been doing it, but a while.

Anyway, it was seeing her original review that gave me the idea for this contest, and it seems like even that review was her B game, since she put in some great alternates. I like the second one the best.

Third Prize (UK Painted Man 1st edition paperback, autographed):

Terror walked the night
But I took up its dread spear
Now the dark fears me

Posted by Alex

Really good. Alex wanted to throw an extra comma and an italic into the last line, but I think the words are stronger without. I’m a believer in dropping unnecessary formatting and punctuation in poetry.

Second Prize (The Warded Man 1st Edition hardcover, autographed):

Misty death rising
Demons forming as night falls
Outside warded doors

No willing fighters
Just remains and survivors
Hiding behind wards

Warded walls and doors
Fend off the hordes of demons
Draw well and check twice

Is he a monster?
Has he lost humanity
Battling demons?

I loved Warded Man
The characters made the book
Can’t wait to read more

Posted by Lauren

Pause to appreciate this body of work. Every one a serious contender. In some ways, though, I like the last one the best. If the purpose of a review is to let people know whether or not they should buy a book and why, this does an excellent job of boiling down all the essential elements of a positive review into 17 syllables.

First Prize (Autographed complete set of all three Japanese Painted Man 1st edition volumes):

If anyone deserves to win, it’s Hon with his dueling Yin/Yang poems about the book itself and his experience reading it. In addition to writing stellar haiku, Hon went for all the extra credit points I mentioned on the blog, providing the poem in essentially three languages AND posting the first one as a book review on Amazon.co.uk. That is too cool.

Fair warning to take those extra credit options to heart in future contests!

Winners, please e-mail me at peat@www.petervbrett.com with your full name, address, and anything special you would like me to write in your signed copies.

Oh, and a special stuck-out tongue to Dave-Brendon DeBurgh, who promised to submit a poem he claimed would be LEGENDARY, but turned out to be Legen…

Wait for it…

Wait for it…

Nothing, because he never submitted it!

Look for my upcoming guest post on Dave’s blog, where I will be giving him shit for this, amongst whatever else I decide to write about.

Thanks again to all who joined in. If anyone has a good idea for another contest of this sort, just pop it in the comment section!

Posted on June 21, 2009 at 3:13 am by PeatB
Filed under Contests, Craft, Events, Fans, Reviews, Writing
11 Comments »

Only four days left to submit your entry for my Haiku Review Contest and have a chance to win some cool prizes.

Enter now!

Posted on June 13, 2009 at 1:44 pm by PeatB
Filed under Contests, Fans, Writing
1 Comment »

Been a while since I posted any interviews or reviews. There have been a few piling up, but I’ve had a lot of other things on my plate. I just finished a rough draft of The Duke’s Mines, another Arlen Messenger short, and knocked out 1200 words of The Daylight War today.  I also have edits on The Desert Spear from Del Rey that I need to get on. This is on top of negotiating to buy some office space so I can work, and frequent daddy duty.

I know, bitch, bitch, bitch.

So here are some fun links:

There’s a nice mini-interview I did for John Joseph Adams on Tor.com. The article is called The Warded Man… in 60 Seconds, and as promised, it’s a quick read.

There’s a really great Warded Man review on Black Gate. I almost crapped my pants reading it, because the review starts out with a tone that makes you think the reviewer is going to really rip into it, and then it suddenly turns into a glowing and powerful endorsement that really understood what I was trying to do in the story. I didn’t see that coming.

Fantasy Magazine posted a great Warded Man review a couple of weeks ago, as well, and there’s one on Christina Rickard’s blog, another on A Mingled Yarn, and a few more on Rate it All, including one where someone writes this nice review saying they liked the book, and then gave it 2 out of 5 stars. WTF?

James on Speculative Horizons was threatening to review The Painted Man for a while, and finally posted that today. He generally gives it a thumbs up, but gave a few criticisms. What was amazing was the fact that several people quickly commented in my defense, and an interesting debate came out of it. Check it out here: Speculative Horizons Painted Man Review.

Couple more Painted Man reviews on The Deckled Edge and Unbound, as well.

I’ll be doing an post soon dedicated to my German readers, with interviews, reviews and the like for Das Lied der Dunkelheit, AKA The Song of Darkness, which is the German title. Be on the lookout for that wenn Sie Deutsch sprechen.

Posted on June 11, 2009 at 12:18 am by PeatB
Filed under Desert Spear, Interviews, Reviews, Writing
2 Comments »