Wrath of the Gryphonwind is here!

It's finally here! Wrath of the Gryphonwind is now for sale at Amazon in a print edition! Wrath of the Gryphonwind is a gay-themed steampunk young adult novel with gryphons and dragons and a werewolf and...well, here's what it's about!

Young inventor Owen Pyke would rather build mechanical men and steam-powered potato peelers than become an armored, gryphon-riding knight of the sky. But joining the Gryphonwind guild is Owen’s only ticket out of the orphanage. Together with his beloved bond-gryphon Odrynn, Owen and his fellow Gryphonwind cadets train for aerial battle in the war to end faun slavery in the south. After Owen angers his faun friend By’yalt’r by flirting with By’yalt’r’s boyfriend Eryk, the faun disappears and Owen is suspected of harming him. Owen must quickly find out what happened to By’yalt’r while avoiding the violent anger of the faun’s bond-gryphon, along with a private detective hiding a terrifying secret and a nosy reporter who might be a werewolf. But an unsavory man follows Owen to stop the boy from uncovering the truth. And the angry Gryphonwind armies of the southern protectorates are drawing ever closer to the great city of Port Cedryssene...

Sounds like fun, doesn't it? There's plenty of action and excitement to enjoy! And check out the great cover art by April Danaher! Keep an eye open for Wrath of the Gryphonwind in Kindle and e-reader editions, coming soon! But you can get the print edition now. Enjoy!

Wrath of the Gryphonwind at Amazon.com

^..^

UPDATE: Wrath of the Gryphonwind is now available in a Kindle edition! I'll have the version for other e-readers up soon, too.

Wrath of the Gryphonwind Cover Update

Artwork by April Danaher for Wrath of the Gryphonwind

Wow. Just...wow!

April Danaher has really outdone herself here. I love this! The characters, the colors, the whole atmosphere of the work is amazing! She really captured the boys (Owen and By'yalt'r) and the gryphon (Odrynn) so well! I get so tickled when I see something I created in words become pictures in someone else's hands.

Wrath of the Gryphonwind will be ready to read before you know it! Stay tuned for further updates.

^..^

Wrath of the Gryphonwind Coming Soon!

Artwork by April Danaher for Wrath of the Gryphonwind

My YA fantasy novel Wrath of the Gryphonwind is nearing completion! It has young warrior knights flying into battle on armored gryphons and a gay teen love triangle and a murder mystery and...well, here's the description I wrote for it:

Young inventor Owen Pyke would rather build mechanical men and steam-powered potato peelers than become an armored, gryphon-riding knight of the sky. But joining the Gryphonwind guild is Owen’s only ticket out of the orphanage. Together with his beloved bond-gryphon Odrynn, Owen and his fellow Gryphonwind cadets train for aerial battle in the war to end faun slavery in the south. After Owen angers his faun friend By’yalt’r by flirting with By’yalt’r’s boyfriend Eryk, the faun disappears and Owen is suspected of harming him. Owen must quickly find out what happened to By’yalt’r while avoiding the violent anger of the faun’s bond-gryphon, along with a private detective hiding a terrifying secret and a nosy reporter who might be a werewolf. But an unsavory man follows Owen to stop the boy from uncovering the truth. And the angry Gryphonwind armies of the southern protectorates are drawing ever closer to the great city of Port Cedryssene...

I'm very excited about this one! But one thing I'm even more excited about is the cover art being created for it by April Danaher. April is an extremely talented artist, and those of you who follow the Ponies (you know who you are!) probably know her excellent work already from her DeviantArt page. The drawing above is the cover of the book prior to being painted in full color. Here's another sketch April made of the characters in my novel.



I love the concepts and the dynamism of her line drawings. Stay tuned for more information and a look at the finished cover for Wrath of the Gryphonwind!

BONUS PONY PIC: Here's one of my favorite Pony pictures by April, which was one of the pictures that convinced me she was the right artist for this project. I simply love this work!



"Summer Fun," by littletiger488

April's DeviantArt Page (littletiger488)
April's Website

^..^

"Straighten up your gay kids or find another agent!"

Here's a great blog entry about a pair of writers who encountered trouble when a prospective agent demanded that they "write the gay away" -- i.e., remove the gay elements of one of their teen boy characters in a YA fantasy novel they had written. The writers stood their ground and wrote this excellent blog post alerting fellow writers and genre fiction fans to the problem, which appears to run pretty deep in the publishing industry. There's not much I can add to what the writers say or to some of the terrific comments that follow their post. This incident makes me anxious to finish my gay YA steampunk fantasy novel Wrath of the Gryphonwind and get it self-published. It also convinces me that I was correct to go ahead and publish WotG myself. Keep an eye here for updates on that novel, and go read some gay YA fiction! If you want to read something shorter than a novel, try one of my stories listed on the left side of this blog and enjoy!

"Authors Say Agents Try to “Straighten” Gay Characters in YA" -- Genreville

^..^

"White Fire" is here!

It's here! My story "White Fire" is now available for your consideration at Gypsy Shadow Publishing. "White Fire" is an adventure tale about a young faun who arrives in the glittering metropolis of Port Cedryssene just minutes before enraged gryphons attack the city. The faun escapes the slaughter in Port Cedryssene's train station knowing that one of the gryphons is after him, and in his quest for safety the faun finds another boy his age and falls in love. Please feel free to comment here with your opinions of the story!

^..^

Coming Soon: White Fire

Click on picture to enlarge.

Good news! My short story "White Fire" should be going up in the next couple of weeks at Gypsy Shadow Publishing! Here's a preview of the cover for the story. "White Fire" is an adventure tale about a young faun who arrives in the glittering metropolis of Port Cedryssene just minutes before enraged gryphons attack the city. The faun escapes the slaughter in Port Cedryssene's train station knowing that one of the gryphons is after him, and in his quest for safety the faun finds another boy his age and falls in love. I'll let everyone know when the story goes up at Gypsy Shadow.

^..^