Archive for the ‘Hokage’ Category

New Publications Available!

Sunday, December 8th, 2019

Heroic Fantasy Quarterly’s latest Best of anthology (volume 3) is now available!  Included is my short story “Shadows and Foxfire”, the fourth of the tales of the samurai Hokage.  I won’t lie — it’s my favorite of those stories.

HFQ’s other anthologies have been excellent, and I expect this one will be as well.  I am especially fond of the artwork that accompanies my story.  The artist really nailed it.

Also available is the mini-anthology Off the Beaten Path (also volume 3 in its series).  This one features my short story “Going Nowhere”, which appears here for the first time.

Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly volume III cover SOLOOff the Beaten Path 3

Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly volume 3

Off the Beaten Path volume 3

Already Available — The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Volume I!

Friday, August 11th, 2017

Of all the anthologies in which my work has appeared, this one is truly among the best.  Not a single weak entry among them — not even my own.

My contribution is the first tale of samurai Hokage, “Shadows from Firelight.”  I am very pleased that the editors of HFQ selected my tale of medieval Japan to join the excellent stories gathered here, and even more so that the sequel, “Demon-Fang” will appear in the forthcoming Best Of Volume II.

fantasy, Japan, samurai, haunted sword, Hokage, vengeful ghosts, sword and sorcery

A fantastic collection of fantasy tales by a group of truly fine writers — and me!

You can buy it on Amazon from here:  Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly Volume I on Amazon

And remember — Volume II (fully illustrated!) is on its way…

Now Available!

Monday, November 23rd, 2015

The Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly (Volume 1) is now available on Amazon.com!

The anthology features the very first of the Hokage stories, “Shadows from Firelight”, along with fiction by Richard Marsden, James Lecky, William Gerke, Christopher Wood, Robert Rhodes, Dariel R. A. Quiogue, Jesse Bangs, P. Djeli Clark, and David Pilling, and poetry by Danny Adams, Joshua Hampton, W.E. Couvillier, John Keller, Megan Arkenberg, and Daniel Sklar, along with an introduction by Black Gate Magazine‘s John O’Neill.

Check it out right here!  http://www.amazon.com/Best-Heroic-Fantasy-Quarterly-2009-2011-ebook/dp/B017OLT0UI/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1448239216&sr=8-1&keywords=The+Best+of+Heroic+Fantasy+Quarterly

or here: http://www.amazon.com/Best-Heroic-Fantasy-Quarterly-2009-2011/dp/1519150377/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1448239216&sr=8-2&keywords=The+Best+of+Heroic+Fantasy+Quarterly

Coming Soon! Best of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly (Volume 1)

Sunday, November 8th, 2015

The fine folks at Heroic Fantasy Quarterly have just released this truly excellent cover art by Justin Sweet for their first “Best Of” volume, which features my first tale of Hokage the samurai, “Shadows from Firelight”.

The anthology will soon be available in both e-book and paperback form!

Stay tuned here for more exciting information to come soon…

FORGOTTEN PLACES & A New Hokage Tale!

Thursday, March 26th, 2015

It’s now available!  The Horror Society’s new anthology, Forgotten Places, featuring my story “The Treehouse”!

This is probably the most personal short story I’ve ever written, and one that means a great deal to me, fictional though it is.  The anthology also contains tales by a number of other talented writers, including the great William F. Nolan.

ForgottenPlaces-Stack

You can link to the anthology right here:  http://www.amazon.com/Horror-Society-Presents-Forgotten-Places/dp/1505602564/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1427340570&sr=8-3&keywords=forgotten+places+anthology

 

Also, in case you missed it, “Shadows and Foxfire”, the latest tale of the samurai Hokage is now available — for free — at HeroicFantasy.com.  Or just follow this link:  http://www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com/?p=1708

More short story news!

Sunday, October 12th, 2014

First, I’m very happy to announce that Carnival of the Damned is now available from Evil Jester Press (in both paperback and e-book format) via Amazon.com — http://www.amazon.com/Carnival-Damned-Gregory-L-Norris/dp/0692247815/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1413134554&sr=8-10&keywords=R.+Michael+Burns

Second, I’m ALSO happy to announce that my ever-so-slightly-in-the-most-highly-fictionalized-sense autobiographical short story “The Treehouse” has been selected to appear in the The Horror Society (http://www.the-horror-society.com )’s forthcoming anthology, Forgotten Places.

Third, I’m triply happy to be able to tell you that my newest Hokage short story “Shadows and Foxfire” will be in the November issue of Heroic Fantasy Quarterly (http://www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com/).  For those new to the Hokage tales, this one offers a fun early adventure for the stoic samurai.  For those who have read the others (check out the page on this site dedicated to Hokage) this one offers an answer to a long-standing question about Hokage’s past!

 

Progress on Shadows from Firelight, Book I

Monday, July 8th, 2013

With three tales of Hokage the samurai now out there in the world (visit www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com to have a read) I have been at work on a trilogy of novels to explore Hokage’s world in greater scope and detail.  I unambitiously describe the project as a cross between Shogun and The Lord of the Rings.

I recently pooled the notes from my excellent beta readers and am now roughly 1/4 of the way through the first major revision of book I.  (Book II exists as a complete outline and III exists as a partial outline.)  If all goes well, the current draft of the novel will be finished before the 2013 – 2014 school year begins and my free time vanishes like a gambler’s paycheck.

Revision has been a challenge.  Going into it, I felt rather adrift — as if I hadn’t gone through the whole thing several times with Windwalkers.  (Even now, roughly one year later, that work seems grueling to me.  I’m extremely lucky to have had a top notch editor in Henry Snider, who prodded me to fix problems large and small and definitely helped transform Windwalkers into a better book than it was when I handed it to him.)

Furthermore, many of the comments I got from any one beta reader were echoed by another, or several, but some were directly contradictory.  And, while the feedback was extremely helpful and unnervingly accurate, it’s been tricky trying to solve the various problems folks have pointed out to me.  I’ve also found that, because I have a writer’s ego, I have to process the comments and digest them until they seem like my own observations that some other very clever people were willing to reiterate for me.  Once it seems like it was my idea all along I have a much easier time of incorporating it into my work.  It is, admittedly, rather silly, but that way it feels less intrusive to me — I’m not doing someone else’s writing, I’m doing my own.

In any event, the process certainly has served to reinforce in my mind — if it were at all necessary — the value of good beta readers.  I can’t be certain that I’m implementing the changes as well as I ought to be, but I am completely confident that the book will be substantially improved when I finish.

Then, of course, there’s the small matter of the next round of revisions and edits and, assuming I survive all of that with my minimal remaining sanity sufficiently intact, looking for someone who’s willing to bring the thing to life in print.

So, if you’ve given this a read and you’re with me, wish me luck!  I’ll happily take every little bit that I can get my karmic fingers on.

Hokage and I are Featured on the JETWit Author’s Page!

Saturday, February 9th, 2013

Thanks to my friend in Japan, Miguel (yes, he lives in Japan, but as his name suggests, he’s French Canadian; no, I don’t get it, either) Gemma Vidal at JETWit has been kind enough to feature some of my work.  JETWit is a website featuring news and information about those of us who have been participants on the Japan Exchange Teacher Programme.  I was a JET from 2000 to 2003 and taught at a couple of junior high schools in my Japanese hometown of Fukaya, Saitama, just northwest of Tokyo.  And — just in case it isn’t clear — none of the tales of Hokage the Samurai would exist had I not had this amazing opportunity to explore the Land of the Rising Sun and its culture and history.

Have a look at the JETWit page here:  http://jetwit.com/wordpress/2013/02/08/new-to-the-jet-alum-author-beat-r-michael-burns/

Thanks Gemma and JETWit!

Newest tale of Hokage the Samurai is Now Available!

Saturday, January 5th, 2013

“Shadows and Hellfire” — the third tale of the samurai Hokage and his shape-shifting companion Sasa — is now up on Heroic Fantasy Quarterly!

You can jump straight to my tale by going here: http://www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com/?p=1293 — but do give the rest of the issue a look!  And remember, you can find the previous tales by poking around in their archives, or by going to the page on my website devoted to the Hokage tales.