So A Funny Thing Happened ... !

Hi Guys,

 

 

Yes, you guessed it - the Barton Villa bug grabbed me again! This is the problem with being a pantster - I never know what I'm going to write next.

But I'm really happy with this book. I'd missed that crazy island and it's characters, even after I had so successfully ended the previous trilogy by sending everyone off to Mars to live happily ever after. It's a little like that old sweat shirt you put away in the closet which you think you'll never wear again because it's a bit faded and maybe it's got a loose thread here and there. And then one day you find youself thinking about it and pulling it out because you really liked it.

So that's what happened to me. But as I swung into it again, I decided that I had to make a few changes. For a start I didn't want to bring Moncrief Jones out of retirement - I mean the man's been shot, beaten up, in a car crash and suffered numerous other horrid injuries. It's getting old. So I thought I should let him be. At least for now. (But who knows, there could be another good beating in his future!)

I also wanted it to be a harder, edgier sort of book. More a Sam Watson type story - and you know she's always ready with her gun - and it's trained on the bad guy's nuts!!!

The other thing I did was to go back to the racism theme I explored in book three. I don't know why exactly but something about all the Black Lives Matter protests and the police killing of George Floyd etc, has really got under my skin a little. You can't watch that horrible event and not think to yourself, just what the hell is he doing? It just goes on and on. Also the John Griffin story - Black Like Me - has stayed with me for a long time. Not just the experience of a white reporter medically altering himself to appear black and experience life as such, but the reaction he got after what he'd done was revealed. It really is a thought provoking story. So I returned to that and made the bad guys the white supremacists who had united into a world wide movement. (Something about that feels horribly close to the bone lately.)

The other thing I should mention is that us sci fi writers are supposed to pose questions about the future etc and of course various technological advances coming. The genetic manipulation needed to change a person's skin colour from white to black or any other colour of the rainbow, is probably only five to ten years away. The ethics involved in doing so however are light years beyond us!

So just think - what are you going to do when your son or your daughter comes to you one day and says - I want to be black / or white / or yellow? Makes you think, doesn't it!

Anyway that's where the book comes from, and I hope people enjoy it.

Cheers, Greg.

Barton Villa Takes To The Press

Hi Guys,

So March nears it's shocking end and this coronavirus outbreak has exploded into something I don't think anyone saw coming. Certainly not me. And now we in New Zealand are in our second day of lock down, and crossing our fingers that when the four weeks are up this nightmare will be under control. But as worrying as it is for us, when I look at the unfolding horror on the telly, I know it must be a thousand times worse for so many of you. And all I can do is wish you and your loved ones all the best and hope that the measures being taken by our various governments will bring things under control.

In the meantime I have another book out, Barton Villa Welcomes You, which is a sort of light-hearted space opera set mostly in the South Pacific, which oddly enough doesn't involve aliens, UFOs or epic space battles. But it is set on what may be the strangest tropical island ever imagined. I hope it brings some cheer to you all in these difficult times.

Here's the blurb:


Barton Villa Welcomes You:

There is a tropical island in the South Pacific where the millionaires frolic in the sun. Secretly. Because they're the ones that don't want to be seen. An island where traffic gives way to ducks, the world's richest people ride old scooters over the dirt track roads, and where leatherback turtles have a protected hatching ground – even though none have ever been seen.

It is an island from which alien spaceships come and go – though no one ever reports them – and of course there are no aliens.

And it's also an island which the ever watchful eyes of NovATA have noticed. Which the boss of the alien hunting agency has set his greedy heart on. And which an art forger and an intelligence officer will have to protect. If they can.

But then of course there's the vital question. What will the aliens – who don't exist – do?


Cheers, and best of wishes to you all, Greg.

Madness and Magic

Hi Guys,

Just a quick post to say - Yes! It's out! And I'm buggered! (Also my eyes have gone a little wonky! Editing has to be the most awful part of writing ever invented!)

Now on to the next books. Callum is off to the editor shortly - Shh - don't tell her, it'll be a lovely birthday surprise! And then I'll finish off Winged Fool (yeah the title may need some work!) and then off to Baen Publishing (hoping of course that they haven't read Madness and Magic and discovered a bookshop in it called Baen's Books!)

Cheers, Greg.

It's Christmas Again Already

Hi Guys,

Just a short note wishing you all a great Christmas with family and friends. I'll be busy finishing off my latest book - which might be called Madness and Magic, I haven't completely decided - which is nearly done, and looking for covers for it. And my New Years resolution will be to hope that what happened to Roar never happens again!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year,

Greg.

The Alien Spotters Handbook: Chapter Two.

Hi Guys,

Finally finished the draft of Days of Light and Shadow and sent it off for editing. 237,000 words of blood, sweat and tears, and I'm sure my fingers have grown shorter over the previous months from all the typing!

So now while I've got a little time up my sleeve, I thought I'd return to my blog on spotting aliens among us.

The Alien Spotters Handbook:

 

Chapter Two: Personal History.

Ok, so you've got some questions about your co-worker. You think he's a little strange. That he smells odd and does weird things. He's always watching everyone. And that odd palor. You think he might be from somewhere a little further away than Kansas. So how else might you check if he's literally out of this world?

Well personal history is always a good guide. And it's not as if you'd be snooping if you asked him about his family or where he's from. This is all the normal stuff that people ask about their friends and colleagues.

So what can we be reasonably sure of when we ask an alien about his personal history?

Well for a start he'll have one. It would be a very foolish Martian who came to Earth to study us and had no background. In this he'd be no different to a spy sent in to a foreign land to steal secrets. If he had no background, he'd stand out, and no spy, and I assume no alien, wants to stand out.

But his personal history will have to be different from yours or mine in several key areas. (Unless of course you are from another world!)

For a start there'll be no real way of checking it.

Consider the situation when you go for a job interview. The panel ask you about your work history and your schooling and so forth. All perfectly reasonable stuff. But our alien can't really have this. After all it's highly unlikely that he grew up in Kansas, went to school in Mrs. Meg's School for Oddballs and so on. Certificates of achievement can be faked. Databases can be corrupted. And we assume that people who can travel light years can do these sorts of things. But how would they fake the actual life history of someone who wasn't there?

The answer is that they couldn't, and so most likely, they wouldn't.

Instead they'd do the next best thing, make sure that their personal history couldn't be checked. So expect their personal histories to include details of growing up in strange little out of the way places. Places so remote that it would be a near miracle if they ever ran into anyone else from them. In fact they may well have histories that include growing up overseas. (It would explain any issues with accents as well.)

Likewise their schooling. Since they would not have been on Earth as children, their schooling would have to be a fake as well. Otherwise it'd be simple to just ring up the school and ask if they have a yearbook from 1987 with lots of photos. So what would be the chances that the school burnt down, was closed, or that the teachers they mention have all retired or passed away?

Then there's family. We all have families, and I assume that aliens do too. But their family is likely sitting on another world. So the only family members they could list would have to be fellow aliens also on Earth. Family who I would guess, would also have similarly uncheckable pasts.

Further, those family won't include children. Who would bring a child to an alien world full of strange people that know nothing of aliens?

Work history is another likely problem. Granted they may be posing as young adults, relatively new to the workforce. But if they aren't, the question becomes how long were they planning to spend on Earth as they continue their studies? My guess, a few years at most. So any work history prior to that would again have to be fake. Again think companies that have gone out of business, bosses who've retired, overseas employment. Anything that would make it impossible to check.

So there it is. Another Archilles Heel in the alien's library of techniques to hide in plain sight. So if you do have doubts about a friend or colleague, why not just ask them the normal things you would ask of anyone else. Where's you grow up, go to school, work before coming here?

But be warned. He might not be an alien after all. He might be James Bond!

Cheers all, and good spotting.