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Final Amber, Final Stone

This is it. The final installment of the pulp fantasy story Amber and Stone is here for your reading pleasure. Maybe you’d like to take a moment.

Breathe it in. Savor the flavor of the last adventure-soaked page.

Perhaps you’d like to read the previous installments again (or for the first time) to capture the full experience of reading the whole story. Before you dive once more into the unnamed world of bounty hunters and magic rocks, I’d like to say thank you for joining me on this journey. It’s been fun, and I hope we can do it again soon.

The End is Near

Admit it. You thought last week’s installment of Amber and Stone was the last, didn’t you? “A little abrupt,” you thought, “But still, a satisfying conclusion. The sword-to-sorcery ratio was right on, and the violence was exciting without being over the top. A good ending.”

But you were wrong. There’s more today. And there will be more next week, but after that… Well, I can’t promise we won’t see more Amber ever, but her current adventure will be over.

Extra Credit Amber

Good morning, class. Your assigned reading for today is the latest installment of Amber and Stone, a pulp fantasy classic feature both swords and sorcery. In this segment, you’ll find our protagonists back at school and — yes? Chuck? You should have thought of that before class. Can’t you hold it? Fine. Here’s a pass. But be back in five minutes, or I’m sending The Retriever after you.

New Pulp! Now with 60% more sorcery!

I know, I know! I promised you swords and sorcery in Amber and Stone, but you’re asking, “Where’s the sorcery, Darrell? Where’s the sorcery?”
Fine. You want sorcery? It’s right here, in this week’s installment. There’s so much pulp sorcery, it makes Harry Potter look like Conan. (Okay, maybe not, but I find the image of HP with a loincloth and a giant sword amusing.)

Fiction, Pulp and Otherwise

Amber’s back! Okay, she’s only been gone since last Friday, but if you’ve been waiting with bated to breath to find out what happens next in her rousing tale of swords and sorcery, you can breath now. This week’s installment is here, and it features furry, fangy creatures with a taste, it would seem, for human flesh.

I’d like to take a moment to pass along the online fiction I’ve been reading this week. Once you’ve feasted your eyes on Amber’s latest episode, I’d encourage check out these folks for dessert:

Wil Hindmarch’s Wired Tales - This is just awesome. Each month, Wil writes and publishes short stories inspired by the previous month’s issue of WIRED magazine. The first issue is out (it’s free), and it’s a guaranteed good read, and pleasing to the eye to boot.
Derwin Mak’s The Shephard’s Blessing – This is the latest in a string (chain?) of “chain stories” spearheaded by Michael Stackpole. By pure coincidence (given this week’s musings), it’s a story of Lovecraftian colonial America.
Bryan Young’s The Whiskey Doctor – When he’s not making movies or writing comics, Bryan’s working on short stories, like this one. No pulp here, but solid storytelling and sense of place.

Friday’s Child is Amber

Last Friday, I introduced Amber, a pulp sword-and-sorcery heroine who hunts bounties for money – a bounty hunter, if you will. This Friday, we pick up the story with part 2, in which Amber’s bounty turns out to be more popular than she had anticipated. And when you’re a wanted man, “popular” isn’t such a good thing to be.

Introducing Amber

There’s just something about a woman with a sword.

Maybe it’s Freudian. Maybe it’s the juxtaposition of beauty and danger. Maybe it’s the twist on the more traditional man-with-sword image that gives me a grin and whispers in my ear, “This is gonna be so cool!” like some sugared-up 13 year-old rolling his first D&D character.

Today, that woman is Amber. Her first adventure, Amber and Stone, starts here, with the introduction of an unremarkable, balding man with two secrets — one he knows, and one he’s about to discover. I’ll be releasing new installments of Amber and Stone for the next few weeks. (Don’t worry; it’s short.) After that? Who knows. I think Amber’s got a lot of story potential in her.

She is, after all, a woman with a sword.