last call for Clockwork Phoenix 4; also, a short story

There's just under a day left on the Clockwork Phoenix 4 Kickstarter. If you wanted to pre-order a copy, this is a way to do it. :-)

Also, the latest issue of Apex Magazine is live, containing my (very) short story "Waiting for Beauty." (This is one of my darker fairy tale retellings, though less Lovecraftian than most in that set.) I haven't yet had a chance to read the rest of the issue, but it looks absolutely smashing, with stories from Genevieve Valentine, Kat Howard, and Nir Yaniv, as well as nonfiction from Lynne M. Thomas and jimhines, and an interview with Genevieve.

my first gaming credit

It's no secret that I'm a gamer. RPGS, both tabletop and LARP, are one of my main hobbies; they're also what I studied in graduate school. I've written academic papers on the subject, and grew a novel series out of one of the games I've run. From time to time I come up with system hacks for running games in particular settings; when I was playing Changeling, I wrote an entire splatbook's worth of material for Mesoamerican fae.

Some of you may recall that a while ago, I started messing around with an alternate history for the game Legend of the Five Rings. I stopped posting about that because shortly after I began, the guys at AEG announced that they would be taking submissions for Imperial Histories 2 -- that is, proposals for chapters on various eras of Rokugan's past.

Including alternate histories.

Last night, I got an e-mail telling me that my proposal for "The Togashi Dynasty" has been accepted, and will be included in the volume.

This pleases me greatly not only because, hey, sale, but because I love the chance to broaden my horizons and publish something in a new field. And L5R is a great game, with a rich setting and a devoted player base -- as evidenced by the dozens of submissions they got for IH2. I think writing this chapter is going to be a lot of fun, and I look forward to seeing what's in the rest of the book.