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I have just received word that two more of my sword and sorcery tales have been accepted for publication this year.

The stories are The Moneylender of Oriaska and Ossani's Apprentice.ÌýMy almost tame sorcerer-cum-apothecary, Ossani and his girl apprentice appear in both tales. The Moneylender of Oriaska will be published online first (probably in April) then both will be included in the print and ebook anthology Swords & Heroes 2 during the summer.Ìý

That makes the total of new sword and sorcery stories to be published this year as follows:

Essayan's Terrible Machineries of War (Crimson Quill Quarterly #5)

Lies and Treachery (Crimson Quill Quarterly #6 and #7)

The Moneylender of Oriaska (Swords & Heroes online and Swords & Heroes Vol 2)

Ossani's Apprentice (Swords & Heroes Vol 2)

Mask of a Mad God (Welgar the Cursed)

Emerging from Their Twilit Realms (Welgar the Cursed)

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Plus these reprints:

Ossani the Healer and the Beautiful Homunculus (Welgar the Cursed)

The Dark Priestdom (Welgar the Cursed)

Welgar the Cursed (Welgar the Cursed)

The Forbidden City of Cyramon (Welgar the Cursed)

The God in the Keep (Schlock! Webzine August issue)Ìý

Yesterday I posted about the new stories of mine to be published in 2025 but I forgot about those that will appear in my collection Welgar the Cursed, to be published as a paperback and ebook by Tule Fog Press. This will include six stories:

Ossani the Healer and The Beautiful Homunculus

The Dark Priestdom (first published in Savage Realms Monthly #19, 2023)

Welgar the Cursed (first pubished in Swords & Heroes, 2023)

Mask of a Mad God

The Forbidden City of Cyramon (first published in Swords & Heroes One Story at a Time, 2024)

Emerging from Their Twilit RealmsÌý

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My other new stories will be:Ìý

Essayan's Terrible Machineries of War in Crimson Quill Quarterly #5. This is a sword and sorcery story, which includes a recurring character of mine, Nadrain the Storyteller, who narrates the tale of the great artist Essayan when he branched out into designing "machineries of war" and of the terrible fate that befell him.

Visit Fungosia in 4Star Stories #30 is a humorous science fiction tale.

Lies and Treachery is to be serialised in two parts later in the year. This is a sword and sorcery tale involving three recurring characters Horbeck, Brud and Asner, who first appeared in The Demon from Another World (Anthology of the Damned: Necromoirrium). I have written a number of other tales about them in the last couple of months which have yet to be placed.

It now looks like the first new stories of mine to be published in the New Year will be a dark fantasy called Essayan's Terrible Machineries of War in Crimson Quill Quarterly #5 and a humorous science fiction yarn I wrote a few years back called Visit Fungosia, which will be in 4Star Stories #30.Ìý

I do already have a third story lined up to be serialised in two parts later in the year, Lies and Treachery, which is a sword and sorcery tale involving three recurring characters Horbeck, Brud and Asner, who first appeared in The Demon from Another World (Anthology of the Damned: Necromoirrium).

My only other story so far scheduled for 2025 is a reprint of one that originally appeared in the online Sword & Sorcery Magazine in 2021. This is a tale called The God in the Keep and will be in the August issue of Schlock! Webzine.

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The latest issue of Phantasmagoria magazine is now out and includes a review of Swords & Sorceries: Tales of Heroic Fantasy Volume 9, plus an artcle by David A. Riley on Adrian Cole's Elak of Atlantis Trilogy.

The issue also includes a reprint of a science fiction horror story by David A. Riley: Help-Plants, which was first published in Aboriginal Science Fiction. It's also included in my collection from Shadow Publishing, The Lurkers in the Abyss and Other Tales of Terror.

I am pleased to see a second story of mine will appear in Crimson Quill Quarterly. My fantasy story Essayan's Terrible Machineries of War will appear in issue 5 in January and will be my first brand new story to appear in the New Year.

The kickstarter campaign launched by Lyndon Perry and his Tule Fog Press for the publication of my collection Welgar the Cursed and for two others (Andrew Darlington's The Eternal Assassin Chronicles and Tim Hanlon's Path of the Swordsman) has passed its target figure of $1000.Ìý

My hero and mercenary is in trouble. Follow along as Welgar faces an Agryptian demon god and experience his subsequent quest to rid himself of the evil that has befallen him. Six tales of dark and sorcerous fantasy.Ìý

My collection is to be published as a paperback and ebook.Ìý

Sample one for free. Read “â€� by David A. RileyÌýat Swords & Heroes eZine.

Contract signed for another sword and sorcery tale, Lies and Treachery, which is a further adventure of my mercenary heroes Horbeck, Brud and Asner. This longish story (11,100 words) will be serialised in April and July next year. This is a sequel to The Demon from Another World which was recently published in Anthology of the Damned: Necromoirrium from TreeShaker Books. This was also quite a long tale, standing at 9,900 words.I now have to find homes for my other Horbeck & Co tales: The Mummified Demi-God, Dead Thieves in the Night and The Sorcerer's Casket.ÌýÌýJust to add to the tally I'm currently working on yet another story in their saga, A Murder of Necromancers.

My next new sword and sorcery story, Essayan's Terrible Machineries of War will be published next month. I just had the edits for it earlier today. Very light edits, mainly just the addition of a few commas, about which I must admit to being a bit mean.

More about this soon.Ìý

My copy of Schlock! Webzine for December 2024 arrived today with my sword and sorcery story Baal the Necromancer reprinted in it.Ìý

First published in Mythic magazine #17 in 2021, my sword and sorcery story Baal the Necromancer has just been reprinted in the December. 2024 issue of Schlock! Webzine. I did write a sequel of sorts to this, The Storyteller of Koss which was first published in Summer of Sci-Fi and Fantasy in 2022 and again reprinted in Schlock! Webzine in its October 2024 issue.