All posts by ka1spriggs

Kal Spriggs is a science fiction and fantasy author. His website is kalspriggs.com He is an avid reader of books, enjoys gaming, and lives in Colorado.
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New Release: Shadows of Valor

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My newest book in the Star Portal Universe is now available. Shadows of Valor is a story about those left behind on Century after the events of Valor’s Stand. It features Alexander Karmazin and Ashiri Takenata and their trials and tribulations. https://amzn.to/3WnlEQi

Left Behind.

Ashiri Takenata has crashed upon the surface of Century, in the final minutes of the defense of the system from invasion. Alexander Karmazin is trapped in an underground prison cell while the renegade militia abandoned him. Their planet has been conquered by the alien Culmor Empire.

They have no means to fight back. The enemy can bombard or gas the planet at any time, with any provocation. The smart thing to do would be to give up. To make the best of things, to try and rebuild, and to fall into line.

Ashiri doesn’t have it in her to give up. She’s seen one world fall to conquest and rebuilt her life. Alexander Karmazin, a child of two worlds, isn’t about to let either of them disappear under a conquerer’s boot.

The pair of them will figure out how to fight back. They will get the word out to Century’s remaining defenders that there is still hope. They will find a way to get help from Admiral Armstrong, and if that doesn’t work, they will free their planet themselves.

Because sometimes valor has to fight from the shadows.

Writing

Coming Soon: Shadows of Valor

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The next book in the Star Portal Universe, Shadows of Valor, will release 28 October. Shadows of Valor follows the story of those left behind on Century near the end of Valor’s Stand.

Left Behind.

Ashiri Takenata has crashed upon the surface of Century, in the final minutes of the defense of the system from invasion.  Alexander Karmazin is trapped in an underground prison cell while the renegade militia abandoned him.  Their planet has been conquered by the alien Culmor Empire.  

They have no means to fight back.  The enemy can bombard or gas the planet at any time, with any provocation.  The smart thing to do would be to give up.  To make the best of things, to try and rebuild, and to fall into line.

Ashiri doesn’t have it in her to give up.  She has already seen one world fall to conquest and rebuilt her life.  Alexander Karmazin, a child of two worlds, isn’t about to let either disappear under a conqueror’s boot.

The pair of them will figure out how to fight back.  They will get the word out to Century’s remaining defenders that there is still hope.  They will find a way to get help from Admiral Armstrong, and if that doesn’t work, they will free their planet themselves.

Because sometimes valor has to fight from the shadows.

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Kal’s Liberty Con 34 AAR

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The latest Liberty Con is come and gone. I had a blast. For those of you unfamiliar with it, Liberty Con is a Science Fiction and Fantasy literary convention with a very high percentage of writers in attendence. It’s not uncommon to encounter NYT Bestselling authors in the hallway.

There are always interesting conversations to be had and many of the panels are awesome, with many authors, editors, publishers, artists, and other professionals. More, Liberty Con is like a family, with everyone being friendly & welcoming.

What made Liberty Con 34 even more special? For one thing, it’s been a couple years (due to lockdowns) that we could meet in person. I got a chance to see people I haven’t seen in quite a while. For another, it’s a distilled environment of all things science fiction and fantasy. I always meet new people and learn new things.

This year there was a lot of catching up with friends, meeting new readers and authors, and generally spending great deal of time talking and listening. It can be hectic and a bit frenzied moving from one end of the hotel to the convention center and back (especially when you’re like me and you inevitably left something and have to go back a few times).

The convention is amazingly well-run. For those who have attended a lot of conventions, you know how important that is. For those who don’t… well, believe me, a well-run convention will draw more and better writers and professionals and is supremely worthwhile.

The convention staff put a tremendous amount of effort into things and it showed in everything. I can’t stress enough how well everything worked.

For actual events, I was on two panels: World Building in Epic Fantasy, moderated by David B. Coe, with myself, Michael Falciani, Chuck Gannon, and DJ Butler. It was a fun discussion and the different views on world building, especially regarding how much is too much, provided a lot of discussion and fed into a lot of questions from the audience.

I moderated a panel, Train as we Fight, which was a discussion about the realities of military training and writing about it as well. I had Tom Kratman, Mike Massa, and Rick Partlow on the panel. All of them provided some great discussion.

Other things at the convention that I thought were fantastic:

James Schardt ran a miniature painting studio in the crafting room. As a gamer, I thought it was really awesome, and he 3D printed models, had brushes and paints, and infinite patience, especially with how many younger attendees swarmed him on day one. Really one of the best parts of the convention and I hope it happens again in the future.

The Con Suite, always amazing, was running on the 16th floor. Liberty Con serves actual food at their Con Suite, and the draw of good food & awesome people makes for a great setting. I had conversations there with script writers, aspiring authors, scientists, and others.

Many conventions have an Author’s Alley, the one at Liberty Con rotates through hourly, so there’s always new and different authors, every time you walk past. It is tremendously great to walk past, see friends and fellow authors, and to strike up conversations. As an author, it’s awesome to have the opportunity to pitch my books to prospective readers.

All in all, Liberty Con was a fantastic time. If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend attending. Tickets for next year go on sale 15 July of this year (getting tickets and a hotel are the hardest part, which tells you something).

Writing

New Release: Valor’s Inheritance

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Valor’s Inheritance, the fifth Children of Valor book, is now live!

https://amzn.to/3tDTMKR

“Blood is inherited and virtue is acquired, and virtue in itself has a value that blood lacks.”
— Don Quixote

Jiden Armstrong has lost nearly everything.

Her home world and most of its people have been captured by alien invaders. All too many of the cadets and personnel she served with have been killed in the defense of their planet. The Century Planetary Militia’s starships and fighters thrown away by Admiral Drien to cover his cowardly retreat.

All that is left is a meager inheritance for the survivors: a handful of ships, off-world accounts, and refugees willing to give all they have to save their homeworld. Multiple factions of survivors compete to control those resources. Some, like Jiden’s grandmother, want to build up a force to liberate their planet. Others, like Admiral Drien, want to gain the support of a stronger power and let others do the bleeding to save Century.

Jiden, as before, is in the middle of it all. She will have to manage meager resources while she trains up new recruits to save Century. Because whether they can acquire more resources or not, the Centurions are going to save their people. Jiden knows that in the end: all the wealth and power of Century doesn’t matter; the true inheritance of Century is the willingness to shed blood to save it.

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A Note About Valor’s Inheritance

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For those interested, I figured I would share some of the “behind the scenes” writing craft that went into writing the sixth Children of Valor book. Part of the delay in releasing Valor’s Inheritance has been that there are multiple stories I want to tell, especially as characters head in different directions.

For a while, I considered changing the format, switching to third person, which would have allowed me to write from the perspectives of other characters in the universe. That was the plan for a while, which is why at numerous times the next books were going to be a separate series (War of Valor). Instead, I chose to keep writing with Jiden Armstrong as the main character. These other stories I’m going to spin off in separate novels. I made a deliberate choice to keep the existing format as: a) it’s what the readers are familiar with and primary interest is in Jiden Armstrong (I would assume), and b) those other stories benefit from standing on their own and I can give the characters and stories more attention.

It was a difficult decision for me to make. I spent a lot of time outlining and weighing out the differences between the two. Honestly, it might have been a bigger decision for me, mentally, than mattered to my readers. But it was about determining the best way for me to tell the story, so in the end, I had to be mentally good with it.

What comes out of it is I already have essentially three series in the universe: Children of Valor, Forsaken Valor, and Rising Wolf / Fenris Unchained. What I plan to do is spin off individual novels with specific characters in addition to these existing series. The first planned one is already outlined and I’ve begun work on it, and focuses on some of the people left behind on Century after the invasion.

I have ideas for a few other spin-offs, but I don’t want to bog down the main-line stories too much. It’s going to be a bit of a balancing act, writing the three series in this universe, spin offs, and still managing to write my other universes (Eoriel Saga, Shadow Space Chronicles, and others).

But that’s the fun part of writing, finding the time to tell all the stories, right? *Sobs quietly into beer*

That’s all for now, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed the insight into what went into writing Valor’s Inheritance.

Reading

Coming Soon: Valor’s Inheritance

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I’m happy to announce that Valor’s Inheritance, the sixth book of the Children of Valor series is coming 17 June!

“Blood is inherited and virtue is acquired, and virtue in itself has a value that blood lacks.”

— Don Quixote

Jiden Armstrong has lost nearly everything. 

 Her home world and most of its people have been captured by alien invaders.  All too many of the cadets and personnel she served with have been killed in the defense of their planet.  The Century Planetary Militia’s starships and fighters thrown away by Admiral Drien to cover his cowardly retreat.

All that is left is a meager inheritance for the survivors: a handful of ships, off-world accounts, and refugees willing to give all they have to save their homeworld.  Multiple factions of survivors compete to control those resources.  Some, like Jiden’s grandmother, want to build up a force to liberate their planet.  Others, like Admiral Drien, want to gain the support of a stronger power and let others do the bleeding to save Century.

Jiden, as before, is in the middle of it all.  She will have to manage meager resources while she trains up new recruits to save Century.  Because whether they can acquire more resources or not, the Centurions are going to save their people.  Jiden knows that in the end: all the wealth and power of Century doesn’t matter; the true inheritance of Century is the willingness to shed blood to save it.

Conventions, Writing

Kal’s June 2022 Forecast

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June is here, and there is a lot going on!

I’m happy to say that the next main-line Children of Valor book, Valor’s Inheritance, is complete and will be coming this month! More to follow on the details of that launch (including cover, blurb, and more). I do want to say that part of the delay in this book was me determining the best way to tell the many stories in the Star Portal universe that I want to get told.

Also this month, I’ll be attending Liberty Con at Chattanooga, TN (June 17-19). Liberty Con is by far my favorite convention and it’s been too long since I’ve been able to see everyone there.

I’ve outlined and begun work the next Star Portal universe book, which is a spin off from the main series. My goal is to get that done this month. I’ve got a lot going on with a new job, still unpacking/getting settled in to the new place, and all the rest, but I am making steady progress writing again.

That’s all for now, thanks for reading!

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Hi there! A Moon Knight Review

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So… what exactly did I watch?

You might ask yourself that very question as any given episode of Moon Knight wraps up, whether it is the first or the final one. For some perspective, take a mix of Deadpool, a mix of Venom, a heavy splash of the 1990’s The Mummy and The Mummy Returns.

There’s a lot in there, a lot going on. The show takes some hits from some people as being “slow paced” and not enough action. I’d counter that by saying that it is part of the way they are telling the story, which is meant to be a bit of discovery and the audience learning things along the way.

For some valid criticisms: it’s a disjointed, confusing mess. It’s done that way on purpose, sort of, but there’s a hefty dose of “well, this will blow the audience’s mind.” It’s not a standard superhero narrative. I had to read into the Moon Knight character (thanks to the various wiki sites) to find out that Moon Knight is borderline anti-hero, for innumerable reasons.

Without giving too many details away, their whole discovery storytelling would sort of fall apart if we watched the show chronologically (not to mention that a good chunk of the storytelling takes place inside the head of a character).

As far as actors, Oscar Isaac does a fantastic job, especially given just how chaotic the plot and shoots must have been. May Calamawy, the damsel not so much in distress does a good enough job, though there were a couple points where I could tell that they wished they could cast Rachel Weiss from The Mummy (yes, the similarities were that strong). I don’t think the writers quite had the chops to pull off Evelyn from The Mummy, which is a bit of what they were going for. Ethan Hawke makes an acceptable villain, if a bit too preachy at times, which is pretty standard for a Marvel villain.

Is it the best show ever? Not hardly. The afore mentioned disjointedness can be irksome. There are a number of missed tie-ins with mythology, and there are sections that they just leave hanging (only to try and cram a lot of it into the final episode, if they address it at all). It is entertaining and amusing with enough twists and turns to keep you coming back for more. The humor is fun, the transitions are bizarre, and the whole show feels like Moon Knight and Deadpool need to team up for a buddy cop antihero movie.

All in all, if you already have a Disney Plus subscription, it’s worth a watch.

Introductions and Greetings

Long Belated Update

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Hey everyone. Apologies for the long delay in posts. A lot of my life is dictated by the Army, and I’ve been in a lot of suspense over my next assignment, location, move, etc since early November of 2021, with a number of highs and lows involved.

The drama, anticipation, and effort of finding out where I would be working, where we’d be living, selling our old house, finding a new one, changing my child’s school, and all the other dozens of things that come with moving cross country.

My state of mind while dealing with all that has been focused first on getting my family through it all, closing out my previous assignment, trying to maintain my own sanity, and doing some writing when I could. To add to that, my last job at my last unit was extremely busy and as fun and rewarding as it was, it consumed a lot of my free time with meetings, phone calls, and just time spent thinking about how to get things done, right up until I was passing things over and headed for the door. Posting to the blog, has, along with a dozen other things, taken a back-seat.

We are finally moved into our new home, in the process of unpacking, I’ve started my new assignment with the Army, and, yes, I’ve managed to get some writing done and will have a new book coming out very soon.

I’ve also outlined and started writing up new blog posts, including this one, and have some content coming over the next weeks and months that I hope you all will enjoy.

That’s all for now and thanks for reading!

Reading

New Release: For the Love of Death

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Death has a crush on a mortal and there will be hell to pay…

Someone or something is killing musicians in a ritualistic fashion.  The FBI is investigating me because my cases dealing with magic and things that mortals aren’t meant to deal with don’t make for clean reports.  My old partner doesn’t trust me any more and my new partner isn’t read in on all the crazy magic stuff.

All that I could take, except my guardian angel is distracted by the killer’s latest target.  It gets worse than that, because that distraction might just be something more.  He’s falling for her, and if I can’t protect her from the killer, he might just Fall for real.  So I’ve got to buckle down and find the killer… for the Love of Death.

https://amzn.to/3BRwYJS