New Year’s Eve. Second blog post of the entire year of 2018. That should suggest something about what this year was like for me.

When I wrote my 2017 year-end wrap up, I finished by noting I was sick. That was a year ago, December. I had no idea how long that would last. I was happy and in love (and still am) but I was ill. No biggie, I had thought. Just a cold. Or the flu. But it was far more than that. I was down until early May. Five and a half months of runny nose, congestion, coughing my brains out, and what turned out to be actual pneumonia. Four batches of antibiotics. All as a result of what was either one super-crazy infection, or multiple overlapping infections. Either way, after the year that was 2017, spending the first half of 2018 practically (and on many days actually) bedridden meant my productivity for the year was going to be crap. And that’s exactly what happened. There were precisely two publications in 2018 that had contributions from me. I’ll get to those in a bit.

But the first half of the year was shot. No writing occurred, but some was supposed to, despite my weakened condition. I was going to be doing a ghostwriting project late last year or early this year, but it fell through. Just as well, as I was laid low. I was barely making it through the day job, and a few freelance gigs to make ends meet. May finally arrived, bringing spring weather, and my lungs adapted to the slightly warmed air. I was expecting to get right on the productivity horse, but life had two more things to fling at me as soon as my health rebounded: my partner being ill, and me hitting a wall of exhaustion.

Michelle had been dealing with strange neurological symptoms, and was now seeing doctors and getting MRIs, and dealing with the (at that time) likelihood of a Multiple Sclerosis diagnosis. Her doctors have since moved away from MS, but the spring was filled with doctor appointments for us both, and a lot of worry and concern. And each day when I wanted to write, I was wiped out. I could breathe, and I was well again, but the stress was just flaying me. At 5pm I was collapsing. So the spring bled into the summer with family stuff, medical stuff, and me making a concerted effort to spend some time with my kids after the hell of 2017 and the long months of me being sick. We did summer stuff and prepared Michelle for going back to college to pursue the studies she’d needed to put on hold in the past—and we dealt with the worries of whether a debilitating disease was going to derail her yet again.

That’s not to say I wasn’t busy. Kids were coming and going, and I was helping my friend Chris Kuzneski with many of the production aspects of getting his latest thriller, The Malta Escape, ready for release.

I was wrapping up my work with Scott Vaughn on Warbirds of Mars, the property he dreamed up back in the last decade. My work with the series is over, but Doc is keeping the Warbirds flying in his new partnership with artist Mike Debalfo.

My mom came for two visits, up from Florida, and Michelle and I had to deal with getting a new bed, as the one we had was causing us intense back strain.

Late summer meant Robinsonfest 2018 with me, Jeremy Robinson, and Xander Weaver. It was a slightly more subdued affair than 2017’s all-star weekend, but it was still a huge blast. We had a smaller, intimate group of folks, many of whom were returning for the third or even fourth time. We visited a farm, and dined at crazy-good restaurants. There were video games, sweaty lazer tag games, and a whale watching cruise that included plowing right through a storm at sea.

One of the things we do for folks who attend Robinsonfest is try to give the participants some cool gifts. And what’s the best thing authors can give voracious readers? Yep. Books. The last three years at the ’Fest, we’ve handed out copies of a little volume called Undisclosed. These books are only available at Robinsonfest, and are not for sale anywhere. The books usually include short stories and previews from upcoming books. This year’s volume, pictured below, included something a little different: story fragments from books that never happened, and in many cases never will. My own contributions were a slice of the sequel to Viking Tomorrow (which might happen some day), a chunk from a work in progress called Hollow Earth, a chapter from an abandoned espionage novel called Storm Front, and a preview of the upcoming final Chess Team novel, Kingdom (more about this one in a bit).

As I said, if you want a copy of any of the Undisclosed volumes (there have been three so far), then you have to come to Robinsonfest. But you should come anyway. We have the best time, make the best friends, and 2019’s weekend will be in the New Hampshire White Mountains during peak autumn foliage season (aka: “Leaf Peeping season”). Dates are finalized, even though the sign up information isn’t uploaded to Jeremy’s website just yet.

When I got back home from the fest it was time to get a different car, because Michelle and I each had one that wasn’t up to snuff for Vermont winters. It took a little time. We settled on a lovely little Subaru. A vehicle that seems to be everywhere up here. But I figured out why. All wheel drive and heated seats.

And then before we knew it, it was November, and everyone was sick again, although this time, thankfully, it was ordinary colds all around. November had another surprise for me, though. An anthology I contributed to, and which I had hinted at last year, was finally released. Kaiju Rising II: Reign of Monsters. This sequel to the breakaway hit first anthology from 2014 contains 16 all new Kaiju stories from greats like Lee Murray, Jonathan Green, Melanie Meadors, Jeremy Robinson, and yours truly. Just like the last volume, this one has beautiful illustrations, too. Unfortunately there have been some production problems that have led to the paperback being delayed, but the Kindle version is available now, and the paperback should come in spring.

Through December I was working on, and still am working on, Kingdom, which Jeremy and I had briefly called ‘Checkmate.’ The book will be the final Jack Sigler / Chess Team novel, and will also, for now, close the door on the Cerberus Group series of novels. Obviously as the last book in two different series, we’re aiming to make it bigger, bolder, and crazier than anything that’s come before. The book is due for a late spring 2019 release. Here’s the purty cover.

And I did get one other piece of writing accomplished in 2018, which will hopefully make the cut for Scarlet Galleon Publications’ 2019 vampire anthology, Dark Hallows III: Blood Moon. The publisher was kind enough to let me submit a vampire story well after the original deadline for the book. I decided to make the story, “No Hallows’ Eve,” a continuation of my short Dracula novel, The Crypt of Dracula. But the story takes place in Scotland, and it features a new protagonist facing down the dreaded lord of darkness. But for all you Dracula fans, fear not. If for some reason the story doesn’t make the cut for the anthology, I’ll release it as a standalone tale. I have a cover ready, just in case.

So that was my year. And if you couldn’t read between the lines on some of these, this is where the list of projects I mentioned in late 2017 currently stand:

• Project Poltergeist: Cancelled.
• Ice Sheet: Coming in 2019. No, really.
• The anthology I hinted at was Kaiju Rising II, mentioned above.
• Project Fletch: Will be done in 2019, but I’ll be submitting it to a Big 5 publisher in New York. If it sees publication from them, it probably won’t be released until 2021.
• The New York Trip I mentioned last year was supposed to be in April of 2018. It was cancelled. The reason why should be something I can talk about in 2019. Which will hopefully also mean some very good news in 2019.
• Project Velocity: This was a screenplay I was going to be bringing to a meeting in New York. Shelved for the moment. I still want to do the story—either as a screenplay or as a novel.
• Project Phantom: 2019 will see some big things for this project, starting with a very small book collecting some short stories.
• Project Checkmate: became the novel Kingdom, which I’m working on now. Release date of 2019.
• Project Hammer: Hopefully 2019’s Halloween release.
• The Pyrenees Incident: the Jason Quinn novella. Hopefully in 2019, but probably not until the end of the year. More likely 2020.

That’s it. 2019 is on the way. Literally. It’s 11:15pm on New Year’s Eve as I type this. Here’s hoping it’s a spectacular year for all of you. I’ll do my best to get you some fantastic reading. Hold on. The good weather is on the way, and there’s light at the end of the tunnel.

Kane Gilmour
(From his underground bunker,
Central Vermont)