Guess I should note that I'm still alive, since I've maintained radio silence for so long. I'm willing to bet no one is reading this, though, and that it doesn't really matter.

November's work on The Black Smoking Gun Of Temptation went... But I'm not sure I can say much more. I did my 50,000 words, like an inmate doing his time in prison and, once finished, I was gone. After finishing, I felt the majority of what I'd written wasn't very exciting or impressive. I haven't looked back at it since, but I know it needs some reworking and... well, making funny.

But, on top of that, it's not even finished. That 50,000 words is, at best, only half of a novel. And, yet, I'm still not even sure of exactly where the story is going. This journey didn't have a particular ending already set in stone when I began, perhaps part of my problem, aside from writing the novel in a very dour tone.

Maybe it'll be finished someday or maybe it'll become one of many half-baked ideas that I never finish because no one gives a damn but me. Regardless, I should probably return my attention to the huge chunk I've written sometime and see what can be salvaged.

It's time once again for National Novel Writing Month and this time I swear I'm going to fucking write The Black Smoking Gun Of Temptation, the follow-up to The Big Rusty Lie (and also relates to "Boozed Up And Rioting", so check that out).

You can keep up on my progress at Twitter or come watch my progress at the NaNoWriMo site. I'm going to get this thing done this year or die trying...

So what is there in store for those of you who are actually interested (being no one at all)? A return of more or less every Oberwalz-related character I've ever touched on, blimps, mobsters, Grisham-esque court drama, romance, senseless violence, racist vent figures, panda bears, hardboiled debt collectors, murder, revenge, more violence, vulgarity aplenty, and an all-out war between Oberwalz and the forces that would seek to break it apart. Some of it will also be good.

Fresh onto the site are two new short story readables: Undersea Ballet, an older tale but a bit more mainstream than most, and On The Commission Chief's Covert Tactical Operation, a writing exercise more in the form of an excerpt from a non-existent sci-fi novel, apparently written by a lunatic. Hopefully the two will provide some entertainment.

There's a "new" short story from 1999 up now in the Writing section.

With my compliments, enjoy reading over the classic Blofly Sings The Blues.

Perhaps to the interest of someone, the first chapter of a Lynch-ian surreal novella I was writing on a lark, Somewhere In The Dark, is available for perusal in the Writing > Excerpts section, along with a chapter from The Big Rusty Lie.

Download and enjoy or read here on the site.

You can find quite a few chapters of The Big Rusty Lie over at Authonomy, for your reading pleasure and hopefully your "voting for this awesome book" pleasure.

Enjoy it, non-existent peoples.

Hey, looks like the iPhone has a Kindle reader now.

Now all you losers who use Apple products have no excuse to not buy my exciting novel in its digital format, for easy reading on a screen the size of a microwavable chimichanga, just as us authors intended.

It's just $2-ish, depending on how much Amazon would like to gouge you at this time, despite my pleas for bargain prices.

There should be a simple link to your right as well.

Despite tremendous technical annoyances, I've gotten up "No Good At All" and "Boozed Up And Rioting" for easy reading in the Writing > Short Stories section.

Now you only have to download if you actually want to.

Enjoy.