The Price of Rye

I remembered to bring a gift this time!

Hello, friends!

I made something for you! My new short story “The Price of Rye” is free for you to read over at Tor.com!

“The Price of Rye” is set in the world of my upcoming novel Red Rabbit. It’s about Meg Twomby, who’s eking out a life on the frontier with her son. And she’s doing a fine job of it until the day something comes up the trail to meet her. After you read it, maybe poke around the Tor site. There’s a ton of great stuff to read there. It’s like a big free anthology!

And if you like the story, tell your friends, send them a link. Maybe consider preordering Red Rabbit so you can read more about life on this strange frontier. Preorders are one of the two big factors in a book release that we have no control over. I’ll get to the other factor in a second.

Of course, nudging you to buy my book isn’t the main reason I wrote “The Price of Rye.” When I create characters and build a world around them I get to know them, I get to understand how that world works, and I want to spend more time there with them. You know, if I haven’t killed them by the end.

This always happens. Always. I used to write a comic book series called Proof, about a long-lived creature who performed in a Victorian circus, and one of the minor characters was a Scotland Yard detective. I did a lot of research to try to make him as true-to-life as possible, and I ended up deciding to spin him off into his own series, which I (oh, so, creatively) titled “Scotland Yard.”

Then I changed my mind, shortened the title, and wrote it as a novel instead.

During the auction for The Yard I was asked by an editor if I had an idea for a sequel. Of course I did! So that comic led to a book, which led to another book, and another, because each character had a story to tell, and the world I’d built around them still needed to be explored.

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I wrote Red Rabbit during a difficult time, for myself and I imagine for most of you, too. The world’s become increasingly difficult to navigate, increasingly contentious, and I thought this would be a simple little story I could hide away in. I had a long list of completely different things I wanted to write after that, but by the end I couldn’t walk away. I wanted to write more about the weird frontier I’d made up. So I wrote a sequel. And I still wasn’t done. I have more stories in mind for that place if there are enough readers who want to take that journey with me. “The Price of Rye” was one of those stories and I can cross it off my list now. (Did I mention you can read it right now at Tor.com?)

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I said I’d mention that other factor we authors can’t control. It’s the oldest and it’s still the best way of getting books noticed. You guessed it, it’s word of mouth. An author can yell about their new release from every social media mountaintop, but still only reach a few people. So we all hope you’ll tell your friends about the things you like. If you enjoy “The Price of Rye,” maybe you’ll let people know. Same with Red Rabbit. And to that end, I thought I’d share a couple of my new favorite things (click on the images for more info)…

Knock Knock, Open Wide weaves horror and Celtic myth into a terrifying, heartbreaking supernatural tale of fractured family bonds, the secrets we carry, and the veiled forces that guide Irish life.

When the door between the known and unknown opens, it can never close again.

"Genuinely terrifying, the sort of book you shut away in the freezer at night so it won’t come looking for you. That is, if you can put it down. Knock Knock, Open Wide deservedly places Neil Sharpson at the front rank of modern horror writers. Open wide, if you dare, and read.” ―Alex Grecian, New York Times bestselling author of Red Rabbit

A sharp, savvy mystery about an autistic editor who inherits a crumbling English estate, only to find herself at the center of a murder investigation when a family portrait vanishes and a dead body turns up.

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And here’s a couple I haven’t read yet, but I plan to take them with me on my travels this month because I’ve heard great things…

A small town is transformed when seven strange trees begin bearing magical apples in this masterpiece of horror from the bestselling author of Wanderers and The Book of Accidents.

Vampires and vaqueros face off on the Texas-Mexico border in this supernatural western from the author of The Hacienda.

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People, I have a new book coming out in less than two weeks! There’s a lot to do between now and then, but I’ll send out a friendly reminder before I hit the road to talk about the Old West that never was. As always, if you’d like a signed and/or personalized copy of Red Rabbit, or any of my books, please contact Round Table Bookstore and let them know.

Your friend,

Alex