Updated 6-19-2017:
Brass Stars has been revised and expanded, and A. G. Carpenter now has the dark and gory (and gorgeous) results here.
Her new cover isn’t shabby, either.
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A fun debut today for my friend A. G. Carpenter, who is a far better (and more prolific) writer than I am. Remember the name, folks – she’s already published a lot of sly, haunting, gorgeous short fiction in a variety of genres, but her longer work is going to be Known.
Beginning here, from the fine folks at Eggplant Productions: Brass Stars, a gun-slinging sort of space opera with a twist or two.
Blurb:
Tashndelu Sand has wandered the known universe on a mission of vengeance. She’s spent years tracking down the gang who murdered her mother. And, with the help of Snyder—a psychotic cyber-horse with an agenda of his own—she’s killed all but one: Brannigan.
Now she’s come to Paradise, a lonely town on a desert planet. Here, Brannigan rules with a new gang. Here, the graveyard is filled with the corpses of gunslingers who have tried, and failed, to kill him.
Get in, kill Brannigan, and get out. That’s the plan. And Tashn is determined to finish what she started. She’ll not be stopped: not by Brannigan’s army; not by her feelings for Johnny, an Extra sapien like her; not even by the darkness she sees in herself.
Buy links: Eggplant Productions
Cover: I have to gush a little and share some cover love. A lot of small, medium, (and large) publishers appear to be stuck in the current fashion for Photoshopped collage covers, with many photographic and vector elements melded and layered with more-or-less skill. It’s a fast way to get cover art, and I’ve seen brilliant examples. I’ve also seen embarrassing failures.
I cut my reading teeth in the glittery last years of the 1970s, when the second Tolkien Renaissance gave us a staggeringly good crop of cover artists who actually painted and drew things the old-fashioned way: the Brothers Hildebrandt, Darrell K. Sweet, Michael Whelan, and many others. Modern advances in digital art tools and processing power have only refined that skill, and given new life to cover art and illustration.
One of the new masters is Alexandrescu Paul, known as Lex Paul on the internet. I am very, very happy Eggplant saw fit to pair up A. G. with someone who did such a brilliant job in bringing Paradise, Tashn, and Snyder to life.
How do I know he painted this? I’ve seen the initial sketches.
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