Pvt. Bill Stamford: Who will he choose… hometown Becky or exotic Franny?

The painting in this post depicts General Stonewall Jackson’s men attacking Yankees at the Battle of Chancellorsville in May 1863. In my Civil War novel, Blessed Shadows Dark and Deep, I show Jackson’s attack and later wounding by his own men. Soon you’ll be able to read it in chapter 22. My publisher, Wings ePress, wants to publish the novel.

Confederate troops wounded Gen. Stonewall Jackson in the 1863 battle of Chancellorsville. In my soon-to-be-published novel, I give his wounding a mystical twist.

The publisher’s acceptance letter came Wednesday. I returned the contract and an information and marketing form on Friday. The release date is Oct. 1. Before October there’s plenty of slogging to be done – working with editors, copyeditors and the cover artists.

Wings ePress is one of the oldest ebook publishers, formed in 2001 in the early days of the digital publishing transformation. Nowadays it has to compete not only against the big publishing houses and other ebook publishers, but the indie revolution as well. They’ve revamped their website; it’s easier to navigate and has an ascetically pleasing look. The artists do superb work. The novels of My Sword and Sorcery Fantasy series, Larenia’s Shadow Trilogy, have first-rate covers. More than one fellow writer has complimented me after looking at the artwork.

This is me — Mike Staton. My arm’s resting on a Civil War era Cannon. By the way, I wrote this post.

Many of you have followed the Civil War novel’s writing progress on my author’s page. I began it in January 2016, spending several weeks developing a detailed chapter-by-chapter outline that provided a roadmap for fleshing out scenes. When I finished the first draft, I ran the chapters through the Online Writers Workshop of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror, obtaining reviews. The novel then went through three additional drafts before I felt it was ready for submission.

The novel includes romantic and fantasy subplots – two women to beguile my main character, Confederate Private Bill Stamford, and an otherworldly gift – a halo that flares around someone destined to die, usually in days or weeks. By the final draft, the tweaking was done. No bragging but I found myself pleased with the lovemaking scenes as well as how I depicted Bill’s struggles with the unpredictable halo appearances.

See? My publisher produces wonderful covers. All three were done by artist Richard Stroud.

In the weeks and months ahead, I’ll give you a peek at the cover. I’ll also provide purchasing information. I’ve high hopes Blessed Shadows Dark and Deep will sell well.

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Some new space news to report. Nothing big. Trump apparently cut the breaking news out of his State of the Union address. Because of time constraints, administration sources reported. Before the speech, those same sources had reported a space goal of a moon landing by the nation’s 250^th birthday in 2026. All that remained in the speech was this disjointed sentence: “American footprints on distant worlds are not too big a dream.”

Space artist James Vaughan depicts American wheels on Mars, not footprints. But you get the point.

Elon Musk of SpaceX trumped the President the day before with his own moon announcement. He intends to send two tourists around the moon in a Dragon 2 spacecraft in 2018… more likely 2019 or 2020. Musk still needs a couple of successful test flights of his new Falcon Heavy rocket and some orbital missions of NASA astronauts to the International Space Station in the Dragon 2 before embarking on a moon flight. Both the rocket and Dragon 2 have yet to fly.

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I’m a published author… three fantasy novels – The Emperor’s Mistress, Thief’s Coin, and Assassins’ Lair. Soon, a fourth novel – Blessed Shadows Dark and Deep – will join them for sale on my publisher’s website and on the sites of Barnes and Noble and Amazon.com. If the mention of the American Civil War and romance piques your curiosity, you’ll want to pick up a copy of my newest novel when it comes out.