Libram Mysterium Volume 1 Now on Sale

Here it is at long last, folks!  It's been a little more than six months since Pulp Mill Press opened to submissions, and now Libram Mysterium 1 is finally finished.  It's been a huge amount of work that has claimed the lion's share of my spare time for the last several months, but it's also been a lot of fun, and I'm tremendously proud of the finished product.  The contributors are a mix of established professional authors, and emerging authors who have never before been published, and I think you'll be as impressed by the quality of the stories as I was.

If you haven't heard of Pulp Mill Press or Libram Mysterium, the anthology was the brain-child of Tim Shorts of Gothridge Manor who, back in June, proposed publishing a book of short stories of the sort that might appear in a modern-day Appendix-N.  A few others, including Ken Harrison of The Rusty Battleaxe, Boric Glandaum, and myself came on board and Pulp Mill Press was born.  In fact, I'd long been contemplating putting something like this together some day, but as we all know, some day never comes, and if it hadn't been for Tim proposing the project, I would probably never have gotten around to it.

Tim, Ken and Boric ended up not being as closely involved with the project as we would have liked, due to other commitments on their time, but their support and enthusiasm, especially in the early days, helped make Pulp Mill Press a reality.

Libram Mysterium 1 is the first in what I hope will be an ongoing series of pulp style fantasy, horror, and science fiction stories, and I hope that as many of you as possible will check it out and pass the word on.  At present the book is only available as a PDF download, but I am waiting on proofs and it should be available as a 6" x 9" trade paperback within a few weeks for those, like myself, who need a hard copy in hand.

The cost to buy the book is $2.99 for the PDF, $14.49 for the trade paperback, and $15.49 for the trade paperback/PDF combo pack.

Since I had no start-up money to fund this project, I was only able to offer the contributors free copies of the PDF in compensation, but I hope to be able to pay them actual money with proceeds from the sale of the book, so please do consider buying a copy - the authors and artist really do deserve to be paid for their outstanding work.

THIRTEEN TALES OF THE WEIRD AND FANTASTIC!

Join vengeance-seeking ghouls in Dylath-Leen; an expedition to the cursed ruins of an ancient city; and a mercenary company with only one criterion for recruits: they must already be dead.

This anthology recalls the pulp fantasy stories of the early- to mid-twentieth century: from pulse-pounding sword & sorcery adventure to chilling tales of the macabre, eldritch horrors, ruthless warriors, and fabulous treasures await within!

FEATURING STORIES BY:

Josh Reynolds, Josh Graboff, Matthew Bottiglieri, Timothy P.

Remp, Tobias Loc, Trey Causey, James MacGeorge, Alasdair

Cunningham, Jared Plumber, Alex J. Christy, Garnett Elliot,

and Sean P. Robson

COVER AND INTERIOR ART BY:

Christopher Conklin

Buy Libram Mysterium 1 at:

Adventures in Hybras

After a months-long gaming drought, I've finally started a new campaign to introduce my seven-year-old daughter to the joys of gaming.  I chose to use the Swords & Wizardry Core Rules; these rules are not quite as bare-bones as my usual Whitebox set, but not so cumbersome as S&W Complete.  In short, it is a great rule set for young gamers.

I've set the campaign on the fictional island of Hybras, off the south coast of Ireland, during the reign of the Roman Empire, and I've incorporated a lot of Welsh mythology into the setting.  I'm drawing primarily upon Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles, Jack Vance's tales of Lyonesse (Suldrun's Garden, The Green Pearl, Madouc) and Grimm's Fairy Tales for inspiration.

One of the benefits of setting the campaign in a real-world setting is being able to use it as a spring board to teach my daughter about different ancient cultures and mythology.  While I've started the campaign in Hybras, I plan to eventually leave those shores and have the players travel the world and visit Rome, Greece and Egypt.

We're already two sessions into the campaign and my daughter is already pestering me for her own set of dice (because, as we all know, borrowed dice don't have the right mojo).  We're exploring the Caves of Chaos from the venerable Keep on the Borderlands.  This was my first introduction to D&D and I wanted it to be my daughter's as well.

The story, thus far, is that a vital trade caravan from Avalon has been hijacked by bands of goblins, depriving the isolated village of Caer Darrig of supplies it will desperately need before winter sets in.  A small group of villagers, led by Brianne the Bold and Ariana the Nimble have set out to track down the missing caravan.  While trekking through the woods late one afternoon, the band came upon a cozy-looking cottage in a clearing.  Ariana the Nimble horrified her mother and I by immediately proposing to "kill whoever lives there and take over the cottage!"  After sneaking up to the cottage and peering through the window she discovered the cottage was the home of a little old lady who was bustling about her kitchen, preparing her evening meal.  When my wife said, "See, it's just an old lady; she's no threat to us," my daughter replied, "Great, she'll be easy to kill!"  I can see that we have a natural born gamer on our hands.

It turned out that Ariana's instincts were correct, as the old woman predictably turned out to be a witch intent on charming and ultimately eating the party.  My daughter's indoctrination by the Brother's Grimm served her in good stead.

After dispatching the witch and looting her cottage of its valuables, the party tracked the caravan to the dreaded Caves of Chaos, where they explored one set of caverns, killing or capturing a band of wicked boggles that lived there.  They discovered the cache of captured supplies and rescued three captive merchants, who informed the party that Caer Darrig faced an even graver threat than missing supplies: an evil cleric of Chaos was uniting the various humanoid tribes to invade the village...

Reaper Kickstarter II: The Return of Mr. Bones

Having fulfilled the pledges from their first, fantastically successful Bones Kickstarter, Reaper is at it again and has launched a second Kickstarter, which threatens to eclipse the last.  The new Kickstarter has been live for about 20 minutes as I write this, and they are already have more than $211,000 in pledges (of a $30,000 goal).  So, if you missed out on the first Bones Kickstarter, or just want fill your entire house with polymer plastic miniatures and risk the ire of your wife (*cough, cough*), here's your chance!

Here's what the basic pledge will get you (they haven't put the stretch goal rewards on the site yet):

Libram Mysterium: Submission Deadline

When I was a kid, summer holidays seemed to last forever and I had all the time in the world to do everything I wanted.  These days, not so much; each summer seems to pass more quickly than the last.  I feel like we only just opened Pulp Mill Press to submissions for the Libram Mysterium anthology, and now there are only two weeks left.

So if you're planning to submit a story and haven't done so yet, now's the time to finish it off and get it in.  If you are working on a story, but don't anticipate being able to finish by the September 1st deadline, email me at pulpmillpress4@gmail.com and we can work something out.  Go ahead, flood our inbox with submissions.

What D&D Character Are You?

Here's a fun little personality survey to determine what type of character you would be.  It's pretty detailed, with 129 questions, although many of them didn't include a response that actually represented my beliefs or predilections.  So, what kind of D&D character would you be?


I Am A: Chaotic Good Human Wizard (7th Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength-14
Dexterity-15
Constitution-15
Intelligence-15
Wisdom-12
Charisma-11

Alignment:
Chaotic Good A chaotic good character acts as his conscience directs him with little regard for what others expect of him. He makes his own way, but he's kind and benevolent. He believes in goodness and right but has little use for laws and regulations. He hates it when people try to intimidate others and tell them what to do. He follows his own moral compass, which, although good, may not agree with that of society. Chaotic good is the best alignment you can be because it combines a good heart with a free spirit. However, chaotic good can be a dangerous alignment when it disrupts the order of society and punishes those who do well for themselves.

Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.

Class:
Wizards are arcane spellcasters who depend on intensive study to create their magic. To wizards, magic is not a talent but a difficult, rewarding art. When they are prepared for battle, wizards can use their spells to devastating effect. When caught by surprise, they are vulnerable. The wizard's strength is her spells, everything else is secondary. She learns new spells as she experiments and grows in experience, and she can also learn them from other wizards. In addition, over time a wizard learns to manipulate her spells so they go farther, work better, or are improved in some other way. A wizard can call a familiar- a small, magical, animal companion that serves her. With a high Intelligence, wizards are capable of casting very high levels of spells.

Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus (e-mail)

Unboxing the Bones

This afternoon while in the midst of editing stories for Libram Mysterium, which are coming in at a steady pace, my long-awaited Reaper Bones Kickstarter shipment arrived.  A disciplined man would have finished the story he was currently editing.  I am not such a man.

I did restrain myself enough to take pictures before ripping into the package and strewing the contents about the house, so I thought I'd share what a Vampire level box of miniatures looks like:


1. The 11-pound carton that UPS delivered to my door:

2. The box of Bones miniatures and the three miniature storage cases that were add-ons to the Kickstarter:

3. The insides of one of the storage cases (150 figure capacity):

4. And finally, the miniatures themselves (click to embiggen):

It took me nearly an hour to open each individually-wrapped miniature and set them up.  There are still some unopened packages in the background consisting of a small horde of goblins and rats that I still haven't opened.

This should be enough miniatures to keep me painting for the near future.  Of course there is still the odious task of washing and prepping each one and removing mold-lines.  To quote Homer Simpson: "Can't somebody else do it?"

Well, back to editing.  Keep those submissions coming, I'm starting to catch up!

Pulp Mill Press Now Open for Submissions

You know what I miss?  Pulp adventure stories.  The sort of dark, gritty tales with morally ambiguous characters that were made popular in the 1920's and '30's.  They've sort of fallen out of fashion these days - at least in short fiction markets.  The most recently published good short story anthology I read was the Thieves World series.

This is bad news if these are the sorts of stories you like to read.  It's even worse news if these are the sorts of stories you like to write.  There are few venues for speculative short fiction these days, and even fewer of them are receptive to heroic fantasy and weird fiction.  That's why Tim Shorts (Gothridge Manor), Ken Harrison (The Rusty Battleaxe), Boric G (The Dwarven Stronghold), and I decided to form Pulp Mill Press.  We want to publish the sorts of stories that we love to read and we're putting the call out for stories to be included in our first anthology, Libram Mysterium.  We know that many of the members of the OSR community share our love of weird fiction and we're hoping that at least some of you are writers as well as gamers and will contribute a story.

The pay isn't great.  Heck, it's non-existent; all we're offering in compensation is a complimentary electronic copy of the finished book.  The reason for this is that we don't have funding to buy stories, and we aren't in the position to make that kind of personal investment, so our plan is to hopefully raise enough money through the sale of Libram Mysterium to offer page-rates for our next anthology.  Eventually, we hope to be able to pay professional rates.  We are eager to work with new and emerging authors, to grow along with you, and to fill a much-need gap in the publishing industry.

We like our warriors mighty-thewed, our rogues cunning, our sorcerers sinister and our horrors cosmic. If you can tell a story with well-developed characters and fill us with wonder and dread we want to see it!

Please visit the Pulp Mill Press home page and submission guidelines for more information.  If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at pulpmillpress4@gmail.com.