Michael G. Munz

The official website of Seattle sci-fi/fantasy author and geek Michael G. Munz

A Shadow in the Flames re-release

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Booktrope_logo_color-300x233I’m behind on my blogging duties, but it’s been for  a good cause, I promise! For one, I’ve been working on writing more of A Dragon at the Gate. For another, I’ve been working with Booktrope to get my first novel, A Shadow in the Flames, ready to be re-published through them! No longer will it be a self-published novel. It’s great to have Booktrope throw in their support for ASITF.

For those of you who know me from my comedic fantasy novel Zeus Is Dead, you’ll find A Shadow in the Flames to be a different (but hopefully still enjoyable) experience. A sci-fi novel that some have called “cyberpunk but with more hope,” ASITF centers around Michael Flynn, a young man struggling to find his way in the urban, cybernetic violence of the mid-21st century. While it’s not a comedy, elements of my sense of humor do make an appearance at times, especially through the character of Felix Hiatt, a wise-cracking self-described “information bounty hunter” who features heavily in the novel. [Read more…]

A Shadow in the Flames gets a new cover and goes free!

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A Shadow in the Flames, the first book of the New Aeneid Cycle, is now permanently free from eBook retailers in the U.S.! What’s more, the cover is newly redesigned to match the style of book two, A Memory in the Black. (Both covers were designed by Amalia Chitulescu.)

A Shadow in the Flames
A Shadow in the Flames: Now FREE!

While you can still read Kindle ebooks on a computer, phone, or tablet without a Kindle via Amazon’s free Kindle app, A Shadow in the Flames is also now available from places other than Amazon:

Save for Smashwords, the new cover hasn’t appeared on the non-Amazon sites yet, but they should have it soon after it goes through the regular review process. So pass the word! Have a read! Tell your friends, enemies, and any hyper-intelligent raccoons you may know who speak English!

Praise at Amazon.com for A Shadow in the Flames:
“A great mix of science fiction and thriller…”
~ ~ ~
“I cannot recommend the book enough. It was a pleasure to read, and I hope that soon I will be immersed in this world again.”
~ ~ ~
“Well-written, entertaining, and a great read for anyone who is a fan of the genre.”

Evil genius reviews A Shadow in the Flames

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An evil genius bent on world domination legitimate businessman on Goodreads has given A Shadow in the Flames a 5-star review!

“There truly is a difference between writing and storytelling, and [Munz] knows both. He teases us with scenes that we know, KNOW must be related, but can’t quite put together. The entire time, we watch a certain ticking time bomb of a character, waiting for the moment when the countdown hits zero.”

Read more on Goodreads…

Working on Book 3 (aka Book 5)

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It feels strange to be picking up with a series I’d more or less stopped writing years ago. I’m officially working on book 3 of the New Aeneid Cycle. There, I said it.

I hadn’t expected to be doing so, quite honestly. As you can see from the left column over there (to the left, as you can probably imagine), the series consists thus far of A Shadow in the Flames and A Memory in the Black. I first published ASITF in late 2007 in paperback, mostly just to be able to get it out of my mind so I could move on to writing other books. Yet in the time since, people would often ask, upon hearing I’d published a novel, “Can I get it on Kindle?” I’d gotten tired of telling them no, so last June saw the release of the revised version for Kindle.

It’s a different publishing world than it was in 2007. (Strange how only half a decade can bring so much change!) My experience with getting ASITF to Kindle went so smoothly that I decided to finally release A Memory in the Black. After all, it was mostly finished already. I’d simply not bothered to release it for logistical reasons which, these days, are moot. With a bit of final polishing and a cover design by Amalia Chitulescu, it came to Kindle on August 20th. To date, there have been over 2,000 downloads and the average Amazon review is 4.5 stars!

And so, with what appears to be a growing audience for the series (and some plans of mine to further widen that audience) coupled with some troubles at getting a different manuscript project past the outlining stage, I decided that, hey, I should write book #3! So far, it’s a bit of a challenge picking up where I left off. The act of getting AMITB ready for publication did help me re-acquaint myself with the characters, and I do know where I want things to end up by the end of book 3 (this is a trilogy, by the way), but I don’t yet know quite how to get there, each character’s part, or how to put it all together. I’m having to re-evaluate some long-held ideas for book 3, but I’m also finding new and more interesting options.

But it’s still in the early stages. For those of you who’ve finished book 2, however, I can tell you: I DO know what’s going to happen with the, um… Well, you’ve read it. You can probably guess to what I’m referring. The working title for book 3? Here Be Dragons.

So why do I call it book 5 in the title? After writing AMITB, I wrote two other manuscripts: a comedic contemporary fantasy titled Murdering Zeus for Fun and Prophet and a more serious contemporary fantasy titled A Memory of Dragons. (Okay, so I have a thing for memory and dragons.) I’ve not forgotten about these! But that’s all I’ll say about them in this entry…

Incidentally, watch this blog and my Twitter feed for more news about A Shadow in the Flames in a little while…

Capital Gamer: Book Review: A Shadow in the Flames

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Blogger Aithne just posted a review of A Shadow in the Flames and called it “well-written, entertaining, and a great read for anyone who is a fan of the genre!” Click on the link below to read more!

Capital Gamer: Book Review: A Shadow in the Flames:

I recently had the opportunity to read A Shadow in the Flames , the first novel by Seattle-based sci-fi/fantasy writer Michael G. Munz. A near-future science fiction adventure/thriller, the story follows a colorful cast of characters… (more)

A Memory in the Black: Coming August 20th!

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A Memory in the Black, the long-awaited sequel to A Shadow in the Flames, will be coming to Kindle on Tuesday, August 20th:

Save humanity from itself. It is the goal of the worldwide conspiracy known as the Agents of Aeneas. For months they have struggled to unlock the secrets of an alien spacecraft buried on the Moon. Now word of that craft has leaked, and multiple groups plot to seize it for themselves.

One man has plumbed its depths and returned alive. While Agent Michael Flynn protects him from those who believe that he knows too much, together they must find a demon from Michael’s past: the freelancer Diomedes. Michael’s violent ex-mentor, Diomedes murdered a man at the heart of the spacecraft’s discovery. They must learn why.

Meanwhile the vigilante Gideon, slain by Diomedes six months ago, has been seen alive in the city of Northgate. His baffling return will draw two women into dangers far beyond those that lurk in the city.

Memories that haunt them all will entangle their fates as one in the blackness.

Coming August 20, 2013.

Don’t have a Kindle? You can still read Kindle books on your computer, tablet, or smartphone with the free Kindle app!

A Shadow in the Flames price drop

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A few novel announcements…

Now 99 cents!

#1: The revised edition of A Shadow in the Flames is now just $.99 on Kindle, and will be staying at that price for some time in honor of the upcoming Kindle release of the sequel, A Memory in the Black.

#2: Speaking of A Memory in the Black, I’ve just picked a cover design from my design contest on 99Designs. The winning designer is Amalia Chitulescu (link goes to her Facebook profile). I’ll be posting a look at her winning design here soon, once everything is officially official.

For those of you who haven’t heard of 99Designs (and I hadn’t heard of it myself until quite recently), it’s essentially a crowdsourcing website where you submit a design need and put up a sum of money as a prize for the best design. Then designers look at your request and begin submitting designs for you to rate, comment on, and request changes for. I started my contest about a week and a half ago, and I spent about 2 hours each day just going through designs and giving my feedback. Over the course of the contest, I wound up getting 320 total designs from 36 designers. (Of course, some of those 320 were adjustments to already submitted designs that I’d requested, but I still got a LOT of variety.) All of the designers were responsive and helpful in trying to meet my needs.

After four days of open submissions, the contest moves to a “final” stage, wherein I had to pick 6 designers to continue on and work with me for another 3 days to create their final submission. Just narrowing it down to 6 was difficult. When the final stage was over and it was time to pick a winner, that was an even harder choice. I spent three days agonizing over my options, going back and forth, and trying to choose from 6 final (and unique) choices, some of which had multiple versions for me to decide on.

But hey, now I’ve got a great, professional looking cover.

Most of the designs I received were combinations of photographic images – there wasn’t too much in the way of painted artwork, though there was some. I think if I were doing a fantasy book cover, I’d either go elsewhere or create a contest with a higher reward (you can increase the amount you’re offering, which I’m told brings in even more, and possibly better, designers). But I’m more than happy with my results here.