Here's something I've been looking forward to for months.

I was very pleased to have a story included in Pyr Books' new original SF anthology Fast Forward 2, which will soon be available in all good book stores. I was even more pleased when editor Lou Anders told me he'd be launching the anthology by putting my story, complete, up on the Pyr website, as he's done with the first chapters of many of the books he releases. Now that day has arrived, and the story, 'Catherine Drewe', is up:

http://www.pyrsf.com/SampleChapters.html

And it's great to see it there. The story is the first in a series I've put together. The second, 'One of Our Bastards is Missing' is in the Third Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, coming soon.

Here's how I've described the series in the new Pyr newsletter:

'They're the stories of Major Jonathan Hamilton, who serves with the 4th Dragoon Regiment of the British army in a present day rather unlike our own. Because of a single difference in the timeline (that I haven't yet revealed), the empires of Europe remain in place, and have indeed spread out to compete in the colonisation of the solar system, and the Great Game espionage cold war between them continues on many fronts. Indeed, the concept of a great balance to be kept has seeped into the fabric of these civilisations in all sorts of ways. Hamilton is often called upon to work out of uniform, as what we'd these days call an intelligence officer, intervening in the plans of rival empires. Hamilton himself is damaged, vulnerable, but also terse, repressed and honourable, though his concept of honour is shaped by his society. He can be horribly dangerous to those who get in the way of his duty, but he feels a need to be tender with innocents. He's not cruel in everyday life, but he can be something of a sadist when his mission and the nature of his enemy gives him leave to be. Indeed, he lets himself enjoy those moments of release. His relationships with women are complicated and rare. I like to think I'm writing in the tradition of Ian Fleming's Bond novels (not the movies) but I'm trying to stay away from pastiche, and instead hope to explore the same debates about masculinity and Britishness he did, while perhaps coming to different conclusions. I also hope this is serious SF in all sorts of ways, and that the politics and tactics make them genuine espionage stories too, but that they're also, well, fun!'

Do pop over and have a read. And check out the anthology itself:

http://www.pyrsf.com/FastForward-2.html

All in all, I'm having a very good week. I hope to see some of you this weekend in Birmingham. Until then, Cheerio!