Five Magics Released!

I am happy to announce the release of Five Magics a new collection of my fantasy short stories in multiple e-versions:

For the Kindle at Amazon.com
All other formats at Smashwords

The collection includes five previously published stories. I don’t write that much fantasy in short form these days, but, as you’ll learn below, they are some of my favorite stories.

The table of contents is:

A Gathering of Bones
Ties That Bind
The Family Tree
True Power
The Time of Leaving

To kick it off here, I thought I would post my introduction. So, here it is:

Introduction

If I am allowed to enjoy my own work to some humble degree, the stories in this collection are some of my favorites. Having grown up reading Moorcock, Tolkien, and Leiber, fantasy has always been a guilty pleasure. The magic inherent in the genre holds an allure for me, a heady sense of expression bound in performance art. Each time the wizard stands to cast a spell, he is creating something unique, something only that mage could possibly create. In a way, each casting is then a test of the wizard’s mettle. These mages and their spells are little metaphors of life that way. Each casting is its own adventure, full of inconsistencies and leading to its own joys and troubles, just as each day in our lives brings its own problems and surprises.

Thinking about it this way makes me want to live each day as if it is a magic spell, which I guess is a pretty good thing in itself.

Anyway, all of this is to say that I am, and by this time probably always will be, a fan of mages, magic, and barbaric swordsfolk of all kinds. I remember Elric, and Gandalf, and Fafhrd before there was ever the visual aid of today’s movies that are so beautiful, but that also strip one of the ability to imagine things for themselves. Movies are like magic spells, after all, just as are books, and short stories. Perhaps that’s why I like these stories in particular. Perhaps I think of them as my own little spells, eh? And if these five magics are spells, then that would make me . . .

Okay.

Let’s not take this too far.

I hope you enjoy these stories, though. I’ve cast them the best I know how.