City of Masks

The Gift of Lit

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 16:20:57 PST

Here's a little joint project by some Podiobooks authors, including me. In the lead-up to Christmas 2009, we'd like to suggest that you consider buying our books as gifts, or asking others to do so for you.

HORROR

NIGHT’S KNIGHTS by Emerian Rich

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $13.00)

Vampires on a quest for knowledge attempt to create the perfect offspring, but from the shadows an even more demonic evil threatens their immortality. Markham is a simple Irish immigrant striving for the American dream in 1860 when coach robbers cause his untimely death. Severina is an exotic beauty from the jungles of Brazil whose family is brutally murdered by the same man she later calls lover. Julien is a knight who serves as guardian angel to his family but has no clue about his predestined fate. Will a powerful mortal named Jespa be the one to save them all?

FANTASY

BRAVE MEN RUN by Matthew Wayne Selznick

Buy it here at << Amazon>> (starts as low as $8.98 new)

April 18, 1985 - Into a world already wound tight with the desperate tensions of the Cold War comes Dr. William Donner with a startling declaration: superhumans exist, they demand autonomy, and he has the reality-bending power to enforce their status. The traditional balance of power is thrown askew by the addition of not one super-powered human, but six thousand. Before the Donner Declaration, high school sophomore Nate Charters was just an outsider and self-proclaimed freak. His unusual appearance, hair-trigger reflexes, and overactive metabolism should have made him something special, but his differences and low self-esteem have long since marked him as a target for the jocks and popular kids. Now, just as his unique nature brings him the attention of a self-assured older girl, Nate must find his place in the world. Why is he the way he is? What really happened to his long-dead father? Why is his biggest rival suddenly interested in a private meeting? Is he part of a remarkable, powerful new minority… or just a misfit among misfits? Nate must discover the answers to these questions quickly, because those in power know more about him than he could ever imagine. And they’re closing in…

Mike's Endorsement: I have just finished listening to this in podiobook format, and it's really good. If, like me, you like superhero fiction (and don't mind it being a bit more realistic than the usual capes and tights), definitely check this out.

LOST GODS by Drew Beatty

Buy it here at << Lulu >> (starts at $15.50 new)

Kweku Anansi is just another member of the African diaspora, trying to make a place for himself in his adopted home of Toronto, Canada. He dreams of better days, of a time when he could stop running small-time cons just to make the rent. He dreams of the life he used to live, centuries ago when he was revered as a god. A chance encounter with a fellow con man with a dark and secretive past of his own plunges them both into the dark world of the lost gods, gods who would do anything to be worshipped again. Including destroying the world, if necessary. How far will Anansi go to reclaim his godhood? What will he give up to have true power again?

Mike's Endorsement: Another very good book which I highly recommend, well-written, well-plotted, amusing and exciting.

THE FOX by Arlene Radasky

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $20.99 new)

The Fox by Arlene Radasky is a historical romance and fantasy novel that looks at true courage and truly selfless acts. In this epic fiction that crosses centuries, Druid healers at the beginning of recorded time will be rescued from obscurity by an archeologist of the twenty-first century. Jahna’s clan lay in the path of destruction exacted by the Romans. Her fate is sealed unless a bargain is made with the Gods, which without a doubt means a human sacrifice. Two thousand years later, Aine MacRae is on their trail. A struggling archaeologist, she is on the verge of uncovering the village where they once lived. Encouraged by a ghostly visit, she will do whatever it takes to unearth time’s mystery. Greed almost triumphs leaving the truth and ancient stories buried forever, but an undying love is rekindled.

CHASING THE BARD by Philippa Ballantine

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $12.69 new)

Born into the human world with a gift; a gift that brings him to the attention of powers both dark and light from the World of the Fey, it is his burden to defend all the world. Sive, the goddess of battle, hopes that he may be able to change the fate of her people.The Fey are dying, killed by something beyond the boundaries of worlds, and Sive will do anything to save them. So she enlists the help of her trickster cousin Puck to guard the child, and watch him grow into his gift. But a dark power imprisoned by human and Fey, plots to destroy both worlds, and unmake all that they have created. Can one boy stop the destruction, even if he is William Shakespeare?

Mike's Endorsement: A fellow Kiwi author, and she writes extremely well. I was riveted to this. Get hold of it!

THE DAWNING OF POWER by Brian Rathbone

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $17.98)

The Dawning of Power is the debut trilogy in Brian Rathbone’s fantasy series: The World of Godsland. Echoes of the ancients power are distant memories, tattered and faded by the passage of eons, but that is about to change. A new dawn has arrived. Latent abilities, harbored in mankind s deepest fibers, wait to be unleashed. Ancient evils awaken, and old fears ignite the fires of war. In times such as these, ordinary people have the power to save the world . . . or destroy it.

THE WHITE SHADOW SAGA: THE STOLEN MOON OF LONDOR by A.P. Stephens

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $8.60)

The era of peace among the elves, men, and dwarves comes to an end when one of Londor’s twin moons disappears from the heavens. Without the moon’s balancing effect, evil forces grow bold, and warfare, sickness, and chaos threaten life itself.

Hearing the prayers of desperation that ride on the violent winds, the ancient wizard Randor Miithra, servant to the elf-gods, takes it upon himself to mend the world he has sworn to protect. The task will not be an easy one, though, for the wizard, too, has begun to feel the effects of the world’s imbalance. As Randor struggles to maintain some semblance of his powers, he meets a secretive band of colorful characters from all walks of life, drawn together by a common goal: to find the stolen moon, whatever the cost. It does not take Randor and his motley company long to see that someone or something does not want the moon returned to the heavens.

The road is perilous…the stakes have never been greater…will they find victory…or will they only find their deaths?

SCIENCE FICTION

THE VATICAN ASSASSIN TRILOGY by Mike Luoma

Buy it here at << Lulu >> (starts as low as $35.99)

This three in one omnibus edition collects all three novels in the “Vatican Assassin” Trilogy under one cover. “Vatican Assassin”, “Vatican Ambassador” and “Vatican Abdicator” are joined in this volume by an extensive appendix of previously unreleased background material. There are some early concept sketches by Mike Luoma, as well as “The History of The Future”: a timeline developed to extrapolate from today into the future setting for the story; “The Original Story Outline”; “The Story of The Project”; “The Alien Timeline” and more.

THE PIRATES OF SUFIRO by David Lee Summers

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $14.95)

The Pirates of Sufiro is the story of a planet and its people — of Ellison Firebrandt the pirate captain living in exile; of Espedie Raton, the con-man looking to make a fresh start for himself and his wife on a new world; of Peter Stone, the ruthless bank executive who discovers a fortune and will do anything to keep it; and of the lawman, Edmund Ray Swan who travels to Sufiro seeking the quiet life but finds a dark secret. It is the story of privateers, farmers, miners, entrepreneurs, and soldiers — all caught up in dramatic events and violent conflicts that will shape the destiny of our galaxy.

CRIME DRAMA

JACK WAKES UP by Seth Harwood

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $7.68)

In JACK WAKES UP, we are introduced to Jack Palms, a movie star turned drug addict, turned has-been who has been living off of the residual checks from Shake ‘Em Down, his one–and-only action movie. The money is drying up though, and this new clean, uneventful life is starting to become too much for Jack to bear. So when an old friend comes calling and asks Jack to use his former celebrity to show some out-of-town high rollers around San Francisco’s club scene, he’s happy to oblige. What Jack doesn’t know, however, is these “guests” are a pack of former KGB agents turned coke dealers out to make a big deal with Jack as their tour guide. Soon people are turning up dead, and Jack’s got too many gunmen after him to count—including a South American drug cartel, a mountain-sized Samoan enforcer, and a mobbed-up strip club owner with an army of thugs. That’s not to mention a gorgeous new girlfriend who may be planning on shooting him in the back and the homicide cop who’s just given Jack twenty-four hours to bring down the Bay Area’s biggest drug dealer.

But the thing that scares Jack the most? He’s starting to have fun.

FICTION

CITY OF MASKS by Mike Reeves-McMillan

Buy it here at << Lulu >> (starts as low as $9.97)

In the city-state of Bonvidaeo, by custom and law everyone must wear a mask and act in character with it, or face civil, social and religious penalties. Gregorius Bass is sent to Bonvidaeo as the Envoy of Calaria (primarily to get him out from underfoot). Masked as the Innocent Man, and in the company of his radical young Bonvidaoan servant, Bass stumbles into mystery, intrigue, heresy and murder.

Mike's Endorsement: What can I say? This one's mine. People keep telling me they like it. If you haven't checked it out, please do.

TECHNO THRILLER

7TH SON: DESCENT by J.C. Hutchins

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $9.21)

As America reels from the bizarre presidential assassination committed by a child, seven men are abducted from their normal lives and delivered to a secret government facility. Each man has his own career, his own specialty. All are identical in appearance. The seven strangers were not born, but grown — unwitting human clones — as part of a project called 7th Son.

The government now wants something from these “John Michael Smiths.” They share the flesh as well as the implanted memories of the psychopath responsible for the president’s murder. The killer has bigger plans, and only these seven have the unique qualifications to track and stop him. But when their progenitor makes the battle personal, it becomes clear John Alpha may know the seven better than they know themselves…

SPECULATIVE FICTION

DREAMING OF DELIVERANCE by R.E. Chambliss

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $19.99)

Five years ago when Lindsay Paulson, a naive college student and talented distance runner, was 18, she was convicted of drug smuggling. Now, halfway through a 10-year prison sentence, she begins having what seem to be dreams, in which she leaves her cell in the night and visits another reality called Trae. Dreaming of Deliverance tells of Lindsay’s experiences both in Trae, where she finds herself among people enslaved by terrifying creatures, and in prison where she tries to make sense of what’s happening in her sleep: Is she actually escaping from prison somehow or is she losing her mind?

FANTASY FICTION HISTORICAL

THE MARK OF A DRUID by Rhonda R. Carpenter

Buy it here at << Amazon >> (starts as low as $16.55 new)

Have you ever had a dream so real that when you awoke, it didn’t leave the recesses of your mind for days? Eve McCormick just did, and this experience will change her life and the lives of those around her permanently. A twenty-six year old hypnotherapist who oversees a research project based on discovering the answer to an age-old question, “Is reincarnation fact or fiction?” must learn to trust a Welsh stranger. An ancient Celtic prophecy and long sought-after revenge entangles the past with the present in the struggle for existence that threatens to destroy her project. A druidess and a shape-shifter must join as one to save the Druid way of life, while a Queen conspires to kill Erin’s only High King. Will the oaths and agendas of the past reach across the centuries to strengthen or destroy?

City of Masks review

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 21:09:31 PDT

Just found (via Google blog search, which I have fed into my feed reader) a nice review of the podcast version of City of Masks on Livejournal. The reviewer initially wasn't sold on my reading, until s/he (I think she) realized that I was "doing the voices" of the characters.

I don't have (and don't intend to get) a Livejournal account in order to comment directly on the post, but thanks, krazysidhe, for your kind words. I'm complimented that you thought of doing fanfiction, though I'm also glad you decided not to. And (if you find this), have a look at The Y People and see if you like that too.

Officially on hiatus

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:57:07 PDT

Obviously, The Y People has been unofficially on hiatus for a while. But I'm now admitting it.

There are unlikely to be more updates until November because of looming exams. December to February may be a bit patchy depending how demanding my summer semester study is (probably fairly demanding).

After February, though, I'm hoping things will pick up. Bear in mind that The Y People is an amusement for me and I have a lot of other things going on in my life, some of which are harder to justify shelving for an extended period. But I do plan to continue and I do want to continue, so please remain subscribed and normal transmission should (eventually) resume.

The Y People: A brief intermission

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 13:50:00 PDT

Greetings, Faithful Readers. As you may have guessed, I've been busy with other things lately - university assignment, conference talk, that sort of thing - and haven't updated The Y People as a consequence. I hope to do so soon.

I thought I'd say hi, though, and offer you the opportunity to interact. I'm very happy to receive comments on any post in The Y People - I know some of my fellow Goodreads authors are following, and your questions or critiques are very welcome.

On this post, though, I'm specifically inviting comments which suggest what power Karen might have. I do have an idea, but you might have better ones. We're going to find out in the next chapter, which I'm aiming to do on Sunday (NZ time, Saturday in much of the rest of the world).

I'm writing by the seat of my pants here. I seldom know how a chapter ends when I start typing it. I do know approximately what is going on behind the scenes (which is more than I knew when I started), but you and I are discovering stuff together. Is this experiment sustainable? Stay tuned and see.

And if you have ideas for Karen's power, please leave a comment.

The Y People, Chapter 9: Ructions

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 17:55:02 PDT

Kevin was tying the sleeves of his coat to the door. He let out a hiss, then said, “The guard’s coming. We’ve got about 30 seconds.”

Jane produced her own lockpick and had their door open in the first of those seconds. The three girls spilled out, Karen unwillingly – Marie had her by the elbow. I think she was still a bit fuzzy from the drugs.

“Kevin, get out here,” said Jane. “Can you lift that machine? I want to take it with us.”

Kevin started over towards the machine, which was the size of a large desktop laser printer. I hefted one end. It seemed possible, though I wouldn’t want to carry it far, and I nodded to Kevin, who said, “Yes.” Nobody except him was looking in my direction. They had all forgotten I existed as soon as the suppressor went off.

“Grab it, then, and let’s get going,” said Jane.

“The guard’s nearly here!” he said.

“Then grab fast…” began Jane, but at that moment the guard appeared in the doorway, skidding to a halt – he’d obviously broken into a run and was panting. He checked himself with his shoulder against the door pillar and levelled his rifle at Kevin, who was crossing his line of sight to get to the machine.

I didn’t see exactly what happened next. Something came from Marie’s direction and hit the guard, who convulsed and dropped the gun. I had already pushed off from the table, I think with the idea of tackling Kevin out of the way of a bullet or something, and rocked the rickety platform enough that the lantern fell off and smashed on the floor. It was suddenly almost pitch dark, just a bit of dim light coming in from the corridor. I cannoned into Kevin and bounced off, but he grabbed me and kept me from going down.

Over the guard’s moaning, Kevin shouted, “Everyone stay still for a second! OK, I know where you all are. Just let me guide you. Marie, reach out to your left and grab Karen. Jane, Karen’s in front of you. We’re both over here in the middle of the room. I’ll come over your way and then I’ll guide Marie to the door.”

“What about the machine?” wailed Jane. It was as emotional as I’d ever heard her get.

Kevin let go of my arm, took two steps in the darkness which rang on the concrete floor, huffed, and came back. He nudged me. “Take the other end, mate, this is heavy,” he said. I fumbled for it in the dark, got an end, nearly dropped it and then managed to stabilize it. Towed by Kevin, I stumbled across the room, back towards our cell, I had to assume. He took me on a slight detour to avoid the guard, who was still incapacitated, and I heard him kick something – by the sound, likely the gun. It skittered off further into the room.

“All right,” he said, speaking a little breathlessly – the machine was heavier than I had realized. “Marie, take one small step to your left and then a medium step forward.”

There was a moment’s pause, and then, “Marie!” he yelled. “The other guard is coming. Snap out of it, you’ve got to get us out of here.”

“Sorry,” came her voice out of the darkness, and a confused noise of shuffling feet as the three girls, clinging blindly to each other, lurched towards the door. I heard a small squeak from the hinges, and then there was a light. She’d opened a door back to our home base.

Kevin and I hurried as best we could in the wake of the girls, who rushed through the door. Marie stood to one side, holding it, and slammed it behind us just as a portable light came bobbing along the corridor outside our former prison. We half lowered, half dropped the machine, and I shook out my hands, which had been cramping.

“We’re well out of that,” said Kevin.

“What did you do to the guard?” I asked Marie, but she ignored the question until Kevin repeated it. “I found something in my pocket all of a sudden and kind of – fired it at him,” she said. “I… do you think he’ll be OK?” She held out a small yellow-and-black device in one hand.

“As long as he doesn’t have heart problems,” said Jane. “That’s a taser.”

“You tased him?” asked Karen. She reflected for a moment, then added, “Good. He looked at me in a way I didn’t like. Like I was… good to eat or something.” Her eyes turned inward. Marie’s expression went from worried to dangerous. She took a couple of steps towards Karen and put an arm around her, upon which Karen melted down and started sobbing and clutching Marie. Marie led her off gently, opening a door into a room with some couches where they could sit down.

Kevin and I looked at each other awkwardly. Jane had ignored the whole incident and was clucking over the machine like a hen with one chicken.

“I could miniaturize this,” she said. “Small enough to wear.”

“Great,” I said. “I might be able to be visible from time to time.”

She ignored me, but with Jane that didn’t necessarily mean a lot.

“You know,” Kevin said, “I felt a surge when the machine went off. Like my power came back stronger than ever. I knew that other guard was coming, and I’d only glanced at him in passing. I usually need to have at least a conversation with someone before they show up on the radar.”

“Maybe that’s why Marie could pull something out of her pocket without a door,” I said.

“Is that so?” said Jane, still ignoring me for a reason I was starting to understand. “That’s very interesting. If suppressing the effect temporarily makes it surge up stronger afterwards, that would imply… hmm. Help me carry this downstairs to the lab.”

The Y People, Chapter 8: No Doors

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 19:26:43 PDT

“Jane, this was a terrible idea,” I said.

“Shut it, kid,” said the large man with the automatic rifle. “Just walk slowly and quietly towards the hill.”

Turns out that in the middle of a field, none of our powers were actually very useful, tinfoil hats or not. No doors for Marie to open. Kevin didn’t know the guard, so he didn’t sense him coming. No technology for Jane to tinker with, and standing in the middle of an open field with a tinfoil hat on makes you noticeable, even if you’re me.

The hill had a kind of bunker built into it. The entrance was at an angle into the hill and screened behind a couple of trees. From a distance, you’d never spot it.

There wasn’t a door on the entrance, I noticed. Inside the entrance was a kind of security booth with a transparent screen in front of it – bullet-proof glass, I had to assume. No door there, either. To get into the booth you had to go through a full-height turnstile in an alcove on the right-hand end, and it was clearly controlled from inside. There was another guard there, watching a security monitor.

We were ushered down a short, doorless, concrete-lined tunnel into an old-style prison area with metal bars across the otherwise open fronts of three cells. Two were empty, but the middle one held a rather pretty but very rumpled girl with black hair and long eyelashes. In contrast to skinny Jane and tiny Marie, she was noticeably girl-shaped.

On a rickety table sat a device of some kind, which buzzed gently. An outdoor extension cable, the kind that builders use, led from it off up the tunnel, back towards the guard station, and a workshop lantern plugged into the same power supply gave a harsh light. A security camera with a red light showing was fixed to the wall above the table, and its cable also led back to the guard station.

The guard made us take off our tinfoil helmets and put them on the ground, then gestured Kevin and me into the left-hand cell, where he locked us in. He unlocked the middle cell and put Jane and Marie in there with the other girl. The cells had concrete walls between them, so we could no longer see each other, but we would be able to talk.

Kevin was clutching his head and looking haunted and disoriented. I guessed that the buzzing thing was the power damper. I looked at him with concern, but he glanced at me and shook his head: I’m OK.

The guard picked up our helmets and left.

The girls immediately began talking. It quickly emerged that the pretty girl was Karen, and that she had been here for a day or two, she thought. Mr Brown had shown up at her school in Sydney and abducted and drugged her, and the light stayed on all the time, so she was a bit hazy on exact times. My guess was that he had headed on to Sydney when he failed to pick us up in Auckland.

“He was so weird?,” she said, in a pinched Australian accent. “Not like a real person somehow?” She had the habit which some girls have of making statements sound like questions by lifting the pitch of her voice at the end of her sentences. “And I thought he was going to kill me, or, you know… hurt me? But he just brought me here.”

“Do you know where this is?” asked Jane.

There was a pause, and I imagined Karen staring at Jane, flummoxed. “How did you get here?” she asked.

“We came – a different way. We didn’t see where it was.”

“The guard sounded like he was from the US,” I said. “The South, I think, but I only know American accents from TV.”

“That’s John,” said Jane, noticing me talking and remembering my name easily under the damping field. “He and Kevin are from your part of the world. New Zealand.”

I let that pass – New Zealanders hate to be lumped in with Australians – and asked, “Do the guards come round, or do they just watch the monitor?”

“They feed me now and then,” she said. “Did that Mr Brown guy get you too?”

“Uh, no,” said Jane. “Actually, we were coming here to rescue you.”

“You knew I was here?”

“We were pretty sure someone was here – one of… our kind of people.”

“You mean you can…”

Jane hushed her. “Don’t let’s talk about it where the guards can hear. I don’t know if our enemies know exactly what we can do, and I’d like to keep it that way.”

Under cover of checking on Kevin, who was now sitting on the lowest of the three bunk beds, I fumbled a couple of Jane’s devices out of my belt. She’d made the belt, too. It was a belt for hiding things. The guard, being shorthanded, hadn’t searched us, but if he had, we were prepared.

“There aren’t any proper doors here,” said Marie, apparently irrelevantly unless you knew. “Glass doors and anywhere I can see the other side – it doesn’t work.”

“Kevin, will you take your coat off? You’re the biggest,” Jane said, no doubt equally mysteriously to anyone who was listening, including me in this case.

We normally would have locked gazes at this point and shared our puzzlement, but he looked around the cell somewhat vaguely. His eyes slid past me, and I knew the first device, a kind of battery for storing powers, had worked. He began to take off the long coat he was wearing. I wandered casually over to the door.

“The Centre will want to know about this place,” Jane pattered on. “Marie, do you think they’ve been set up long, or only since the Incident?”

While the guards were, hopefully, focussing on her and the now intentionally nonsensical information she was “leaking”, I eased the other device into the lock and gently clicked it open. The cell was fairly new, and the lock moved easily. I swung the door slowly open and slipped through, pushing it to behind me.

“Kevin,” said Jane, “how’s that coat? You want to hang it across the door of your cell?”

Clever Jane. If Marie’s power only worked when she couldn’t see the other side of the door, the answer was to set it up so that she couldn’t.

I strolled casually and, I hoped, unseen across to the humming box and pulled the cable.

The Y People, Chapter 7: Nothing in the Middle of Nowhere

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 20:28:05 PDT

Jane wasn't making an empty boast about her skill, I discovered. On the outside, the van looked extremely ordinary (and the dust of the unsealed road was no doubt progressively adding to that impression), but it practically drove itself. On this country road, it should have been like driving a hippopotamus on roller skates, but it flowed smoothly and easily around the curves, clinging to the road like a scared kid to his teddy bear.

Even when Kevin shrieked in my ear and I jerked the wheel, it gently ignored me and carried on around the curve we were on, sliding smoothly to a stop on the next straight as I switched brake for accelerator.

"What is it?" I asked, worried.

"It's OK, it's back now."

"What? What's back?"

"Everything. Everyone. I - my power switched off for a few moments as we came around that curve, and it startled me. Sorry, but it's like being struck suddenly blind."

"Interesting," said Jane from the back. "Back up a bit, can you? I want to see if it happens again."

I looked at Kevin for permission, and he nodded.

The van went just as smoothly backwards as forwards. "That's it," said Kevin, partway round the curve. "It's like you've just vanished. I mean, I can still see you," he said to me, "but I can't... locate you."

"You can still see him?" asked Jane. "What about you, Marie? Can you see John?"

She looked directly at me for the first time. "Sure," she said, "I can see him. So that's what you look like. Hmm." She sounded unimpressed. Even if you can see me, I'm still... nondescript.

"And - can you open the door?" asked Jane.

Marie gave her a look, then opened the door which led to the back of the van. It led to the back of the van.

"Power damper," said Jane. "OK, pull forward to where you were before, John."

I did, and we re-tested. Kevin could locate me, Marie couldn't focus on me, and the door she opened was to a cupboard containing old electronic components.

"Aha," said Jane. "Hey, did the van perform any differently in the dampened zone?"

"No, it was just the same," I said.

"So either it doesn't affect my power, or once I've built something it keeps working even inside the dampened zone. Let's see which one."

She pulled out some electronic components and fussed with them, then had me drive back into the "zone" and fussed with some others. She linked them all to her laptop.

"Mm-hm. Mm-hm," she said. "Drive forward." Her attention was riveted to the screen.

She had me drive back and forward several times, then announced, "All right then. My power is dampened by the zone as well, but once I've made something work right outside the zone it keeps working right inside the zone. That's going to be useful. All right, Google Maps."

She pressed keys.

"Now, drive on and take the second left."

I was used to obeying women with an air of authority. I drove on and took the second left.

"Kevin," said Jane, "yell out when you blank out. I want a cross-check with my instruments."

After a minute or two, he said, "Now."

"Mm-hm. Mm-hm. And ending..."

"Now."

"Yes. All right, the instruments work. Now, let's see..." she tapped and clicked. "Assuming it's circular, which seems reasonable, the centre of the field is right... here." She leaned forward and showed us the screen, which had the points of contact, a big circle crossing them, and the centre point on the circle marked on a map.

"I didn't know Google Maps could do that," I said.

"It can on my laptop. There's nothing showing there, just a big hill. Interesting. All right, I think we should go home now. I'm getting tired, it's been a long day from my perspective. In the morning we can strategize some more. Pull in... up there, and we'll use the door to get back to the old factory." She stabbed at a turnout marked on the map.

"The doors don't always go where you expect them to," said Marie.

"OK, but I definitely need to sleep, so let's have a door to somewhere we can sleep," Jane replied.

I pulled into the turnout and Marie opened the door. As it happened, it led to the factory.

Jane was up before us the next morning, and her laptop was full of blueprints by the time we stirred. She tried to explain them over breakfast, but lost us quickly.

"Bottom line," said Marie impatiently. "What do these do?"

"These ones shield us against the effect. I think."

"You think?"

"Well, I won't know until we've gone back and tested, will I? If I could get a good look at the field generator it would be a lot easier. I have to work with what I've got, though."

"Tinfoil hats?" said Kevin incredulously. "You're seriously going to make us tinfoil hats?"

"Tinfoil hats that work", she said. "This is the key point to remember."

"Tinfoil hats that you think will work."

"Look, first we build the hats. Then we build the other gear. Then we go back through the door to the van, drive into the region and test it. If it works..."

"Yes, if it works, then what?"

"Then we go scouting and find out more about that hill. That's got to be where Mr Brown is holding our theoretical colleagues. I mean, why would you have a power nullifier if you weren't holding people with powers?"

"And if it doesn't work?"

"Then we work on it some more until it does. Unless you have a better idea?"

Nobody had a better idea, so we did that.

The Y People, Chapter 6: Why Might We Need a Van?

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 18:33:47 PDT

"Well, speaking for myself," said Marie, "I'm going to start by having a shower. You can suit yourselves, of course, but it's going to be a lot fresher around here if you do the same."

Jane looked confused. "It's the middle of the afternoon," she said.

"Not here," I said. "We're somewhere in North America."

"We think," said Kevin.

"We've just had breakfast," added Marie.

She opened some doors, and there were showers. Meanwhile, Jane went off exploring.

When we emerged, clean, she was excited, in a British sort of way.

"Come and see what I found," she said, and led us to a stairwell.

We pounded down - it reminded me of the stairwells at school between classes, only noisier, because the treads were metal - into the big workshop that ran under the office area. Jane practically ran to a big object shrouded with canvas and began to pull it back. "Help me," she said, and together we revealed it.

It was a van. Or rather, it was to a van what an extremely battered corpse is to a person. It had no wheels and was up on blocks, the motor was missing, and so were the seats. The controls were primitive, worn and dinged.

"It's a beaten-up old van carcass," said Marie, who hadn't helped pull the canvas off. "So what?"

"I can fix it," said Jane. "And when I say fix, I mean, I can make it... better than it ever was."

"What do we need a car for?" said Marie. "I can open a door to anywhere."

"You can open a door to anywhere with a door," said Jane. "What if we need to go somewhere out in the open?"

"We don't have licenses," Marie said. "At least, I don't."

"We do," I said. We had a programme at the school - we all learned to drive, though we didn't get much practice. Kevin and I had been going to buy an old car, maybe, and tour around, camping.

"Good," said Jane. "But nobody is going to check them anyway, because you'll be driving, so nobody will notice our entirely boring-looking but actually rather good van."

"I still don't see why we need one," said Marie.

"But that's the thing," said Kevin. "You always open doors to things we need, don't you?"

"...Yes," said Marie, cautiously.

"So, if there's a van here, we need a van. And we definitely need you, because you can open..." he cast about... "this toolchest here, or that storage cupboard, and instead of a mass of rust and spiderwebs there will be good tools and new parts, right?"

I've watched Kevin do this before. He's aware of people, and not just where they are in a physical sense. He'd spotted - which Jane and I hadn't - that Marie was resenting Jane and needed to feel necessary.

Hesitantly, Marie reached out and opened the drawer of the toolchest.

Power-driven screwdrivers and a ratchet set gleamed up at us.

The cupboard proved to hold new wheels, still in their wrappings, which fit the van. Also, a large hydraulic jack.

"OK," said Marie, "I guess we need a van."

Jane had us do particular things to help her - she did most of the work, but aside from lugging an inexhaustible flow of parts from the magic cupboard, Kevin and I also got to work with her on sections of the car. She had Kevin work on the steering and the wheels, and I got to paint the chassis - plain, dull white. "Nobody notices a white van," she said. "And I'm hoping that your talents will rub off. The van should always know where it is, and it will be completely unremarkable."

I let that one go without remark.

The work went quickly. Under Jane's hands, tools did exactly what they should. Even with a lunch break (Marie opened the cupboard and found lunch instead of more parts), by the late afternoon I was spraying paint onto what appeared to be a complete, driveable van. Jane put her hands over mine, and the paint just floated to where it belonged.

The steering wheel was on the left, confirming that we were in North America. I mentioned my trepidation at driving on the opposite side of the road.

"Don't worry," said Jane. "This van won't let you drift into the wrong lane. When I make a thing, I make it to do what it should do."

She sounded so confident, I didn't argue.

We broke for dinner while the paint dried. Jane had mixed it, so it didn't need to dry overnight or be baked in a kiln we didn't have.

After the meal we hurried downstairs again to look at our new vehicle.

From the outside it looked totally unimpressive. Somehow, the dust from the workshop had drifted over it, so it didn't look new or freshly-painted. The wheels didn't even look new any more. The windows were a little dingy, with an effect like tinted windows without being actually tinted in any attention-getting way - you couldn't really see inside, but it was completely unsuspicious-looking. But when we got inside and looked out, they were clear as diamonds.

The seats looked ordinary, but they adjusted to fit us in total comfort. The controls were in exactly the right places for me. It was all a bit spooky.

We had test-run the motor, so I knew it went, but I had a moment of anticipation as I reached out and turned the key. It started perfectly, smooth and even, no little hitches or rumbles to draw any attention to us at all. It was a stealth van in the same way as I'm a stealth person: it looked so ordinary on the outside that nobody was ever going to pay attention to it or remember it. Yet inside, it was completely comfortable. (OK, there's where the metaphor breaks down.)

We had fixed a second set of seats in behind the front ones, and then a partition with a door. The idea was that the girls would sit in the back, and Marie would open the door if we needed anything, presumably up to and including a place to sleep - there wasn't room between the second set of seats and the back of the van for a bed, let alone four of them and a bathroom and kitchen, but that wouldn't be a problem for Marie.

Marie also had custody of the garage door opener which had been one of the last things to come out of the cupboard. She pressed it ceremoniously, and, as we had expected, the doors of the warehouse started rising. Jane had done something to the motors which apparently meant that the lack of electricity and the fact they'd been rusting for probably 20 years no longer mattered.

The fuel gauge showed full. Jane had assured me that it would continue to do so.

We pulled out from the warehouse, lit through high windows with the glow of a city, into the dusk of a country road. In the rearview mirror, someone's barn receded.

The Y People, Chapter 5: Spies is Never Good

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Wed, 27 May 2009 19:31:03 PDT

"What do you mean?" asked Jane.

I was going to have to get used to the fact that she looked straight at me and noticed that I was there. It was spooky.

"I've been thinking about this. We're not superheroes."

"What?" said Kevin, puzzled.

"I thought at first we might have a bit of an X-Men thing going on, but think about it. Look around at us. We none of us are set up to hit people really hard. What kind of a superhero team doesn't have someone who can hit people really hard?"

"The kind that doesn't believe that hitting people really hard is going to solve anything?" said Marie, with a touch of snark.

"True, but still. Let's look at what we can do. Kevin knows where things and people are. You can get us to anywhere with a door. Jane can, I assume, make gadgets and things?" I raised an eyebrow at her, and she nodded. "I don't get noticed. What's this suggesting to you?"

Kevin and Jane got it almost at the same moment. "Spies," they said.

"That's right. We're spies. And spies is never good. We're talking ruthless government agencies here. We've all had enough to do with government agencies - and non-government agencies - to know that even with a charitable purpose, agencies are bad news." I got some grimaces of agreement. "And spy agencies don't have a charitable purpose. Their purpose is to win at all costs, and they can break the rules and manipulate and lie and cheat to do it. They're secret, so they can get away with things that society at large wouldn't be comfortable with, because nobody knows. Their only oversight, if they have any, is from politicians and the military, who can be a bit pragmatic about means and ends."

Marie was obviously struggling to keep concentrating on what I was saying. It was like I was a boring teacher droning on about exports, probably. I gave Kevin a sign we had that said, "Talk for me, people will listen to you."

"So if we're intended to be spies, who are our controllers?" he asked, picking up smoothly.

"Got to be a government, surely?" said Jane.

"Which government?" asked Marie. "I'm Canadian, you're... British?" Jane nodded. "These two are from New Zealand."

"That's all Commonwealth. Maybe it's the British Government," said Kevin.

"The British Government couldn't do this," said Jane with certainty.

"She's right," I said. "No government on earth could do this. Science and technology, they're all of a piece - if it was possible to do this stuff we do with current human technology, even with ultra-advanced, secret military hush-hush technology, the ordinary technology we see every day would have some hint of it at least. And they'd be giving it to the SAS or MI5, not to a bunch of teenagers. Doesn't mean that some government isn't trying to use or manipulate us, but they didn't give us these powers."

"Who did give us the powers, then?" asked Kevin.

"Beats me. Aliens? People from the future? Extradimensional beings? Cosmic accident? For all we know we were all bitten by radioactive spiders when we were too young to remember. And we know how well that generally works out."

"What if it's God?" asked Marie.

"What?"

"Well, if someone always knows what you need... isn't that omniscience?"

"Depends if it's what you need or just what they want you to have. Besides, I was brought up mostly by nuns. It tends to inoculate you against belief in God."

"No it doesn't. I was brought up by nuns too, you know."

Apparently she could see me fine when she was angry with me - she was glaring right at me.

"Jane, you're a scientist," I said, "back me up here."

"What gave you that idea?" she said.

"Well, you work with technology..."

"Yes, which makes me an engineer. A mad scientist, at best. I'm interested in what works. Theory either helps me get something to work or it gets in the way - mostly, it gets in the way."

I know when I need to retreat. "Well, anyway," I said, "point is, we know we're probably set up to be spies. We don't know for who, against who, or why. Or how. We have these powers from somewhere, some power, which while it could be benevolent is more likely to be... not benevolent, and in any case is big and scary and powerful and almost certainly listening to me right at this moment, even if Marie isn't because of my stupid power."

Marie didn't respond, proving my point.

"So how do we start finding out what's going on?" asked Kevin.

"I don't know," I said. "I suppose we just have to play along and keep our eyes open - and try not to get manipulated into doing something that we can't back away from."

"We've got one clue," said Jane.

"What?"

"Mr Brown."

"You're right," I said. "That's the place to start. Who is he? Why is he after us? Where was he going to take us, and what was going to happen there? Are there any more like us there already?"

"But we already know it's just us," said Jane, indicating her laptop.

"Even if that information isn't being controlled - and I wouldn't bet a sandwich - we only asked it, Who is Mr Brown after? There could be others that he already has."

"Well," said Kevin, "we'd better rescue them, then."

"Dude," I said, "we're not the X-Men."

"I'm not any kind of man," noted Jane. "Technically, nor are you."

I ignored this slight, and so did Kevin, who said, "The X-Men were Gen X. We're Generation Y. We're the Y..." a sideways glance at Jane... "people. I know I for one am asking 'Why?' a lot. And if we're going to answer that question, we need to do this, we need to find out who we are, and we need to do something decent and human because that's what will keep us from doing the, the opposite."

I thought about it. He had a point.

"OK," I said. "Where do we start?"

The Y People, Chapter 4: To Whom It May Concern

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 20:17:19 PDT

After dinner, the cupboard contained a sink, some washing-up liquid, a scrubber and a cloth. Apparently we didn't need a dishwasher.

The water and power were both off in the abandoned building, of course (though not wherever the cupboard led to). So when it started to get dark, not long after the washing up, even though it was the middle of the day for us Marie wanted to go to sleep. We were apparently in approximately her timezone. We might even be in Toronto, for all we knew.

She got her own air mattress and sleeping bag, and some pillows and blankets for all of us, out of the magic cupboard. She then opened (and propped open) a door to a toilet somewhere that got more illumination from streetlights than the old industrial building did, and which flushed. She took off her shoes and climbed into her sleeping bag.

Kevin and I sat up in our bags and talked quietly for a while until she pointedly told us to shut up or she'd open a door to a meat packing plant and push us through. We knew she couldn't, but we got the message. I did finally manage to sleep a little before dawn, but I spent most of the night on the hamster-wheel of thoughts about our situation.

After breakfast, the cupboard contained a computer, which produced a spontaneous cheer from us all. Since Marie was the person who'd provided it, in a sense, she booted it up. We apparently needed a Mac running Firefox, which started automatically. It seemed that mysterious benefactors were into open source, but weren't ideological about it.

Marie opened her Gmail, and things became spooky. The first email was addressed "to whom it may concern".

"If you are reading this," it said, "it's because you are like me. I'm hoping you are able to help me (and no, this is not a Nigerian scam, no bank accounts involved). I can do unusual things, and now there is a very odd man called Mr Brown who wants to take me away from my school. Fortunately that requires a lot of paperwork, but he will be here for me this afternoon. If you have any way to extract me so that I can join you, please use it, otherwise I will have to take steps of my own."

It was signed "Jane".

While Kevin and I were still staring at each other in surprise, Marie hurried to the nearest closed door and heaved it open. On the other side was a tall, skinny blonde girl with thick glasses and a laptop computer. She closed the laptop, grabbed it, and was through the door in an instant, no questions asked. Marie slammed it behind her.

"You took your time," she said, in an English accent. "He was nearly there."

"You're welcome," said Marie, somewhat snidely. "We've just woken up. I don't think we're in the same time zone as you."

"Oh, sorry, thanks for the rescue," the girl said, belatedly. "You got my email, then?"

"Yes."

"How did you do that?" I asked. She glanced at me perfectly normally, without startlement, and said, "It's my talent. Machines. What's yours?"

"You can't tell?"

"No, you look perfectly normal to me."

"People usually can't see me. Or notice me."

"Ah, that will be the glasses. I think they show me what's really there."

"You're not sure?"

"No, but that seems to be what they do. Any piece of equipment I own seems to just do whatever it does, only really well."

"So... your laptop sends emails to people you don't know?"

"Yes, and you should see what I get when I search on it."

"What?"

"I'm not certain, but I think I get anything that's written down anywhere about what I want to know. Not just what's on the web. Anything."

"Now that sounds useful," said Kevin. "I'm Kevin, by the way, and I assume you're Jane?"

She blushed. "Yes."

"This is my mate John, and over there is Marie. We just got away from this Mr Brown guy ourselves."

"Then he is rounding up Talents." She put her laptop down on a nearby table, too rickety and damaged to have been taken away when the place was abandoned, and opened it up. Without her touching any keys, it opened what looked like a browser window with no menus or icons, and with a single field on the open page, like Google but without the logo or buttons.

She typed in, "Who is Mr Brown looking for?"

There was no World Wide Wait on this computer. As soon as she finished typing, the page displayed instantly, all at once. All four of our pictures, our full names, and brief descriptions of what we could do.

It was alphabetical by last name.

Gray, John, not noticed, remarked or remembered.
Link, Kevin, locator of people and things.
Smith, Jane, enhancer of technology.
Porter, Marie, opener of doors to what is needed.

That was all.

"It's just us, then," said Kevin. I didn't say anything; I was brooding over the accuracy of "not noticed, remarked or remembered."

"Your name is Porter?" said Jane to Marie. "And you open doors? That sounds a bit coincidental."

"How about 'Smith,' then?" she retorted.

"I think someone's been having a big joke," said Kevin. "Just wish I knew who."

The page in front of Jane went back, apparently by itself, to the search box, and she typed, "Who is behind all this?"

The page went completely, featurelessly blank.

"I don't think they're ready to tell us," said Kevin.

"Or to put it another way," I said, "we don't have 'need to know' status."

The Y People, Chapter 3: Upsides and Downsides

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Thu, 21 May 2009 19:55:31 PDT

The place was definitely a former industrial building of some kind, and just as definitely long abandoned. We had emerged upstairs, in the office part that extended a little over half of the length (we eventually worked out). Beneath it was a factory or workshop of some kind, and at the other end, taking up the full height, a space that had probably been a warehouse.

We found the office tearoom, a dingy room with worn and stained walls, but several tall cupboards, and Marie proceeded to open them. Much to our delight, the first one now led to our own wardrobe, the same one we had come through in such a Narnian manner. Though Marie didn't look much like Mr Tumnus, and it wasn't that cold.

We dressed in winter clothes first of all, though, and then started going through our camping stuff. We had been gradually building it up, buying gear from the discount outdoor shop down the road as we could afford it, planning on taking a camping trip after school finished while we decided what to do next with our lives. We had a little gas stove, two decent sleeping bags and some air mattresses, a tent (not much current use), some camp cooking gear and a couple of packs, with water bottles and a few camp tools.

"Do we really need to take it all out?" I asked, after we had it mostly on the floor. "After all, Marie can always open the door again if we need anything."

"What if she's opened a door and is on the other side of the world, though?" said Kevin.

"You're right," she said, "better to have it where you can reach it yourselves. I can't guarantee to access the same place again, either - it's not something I control, you know."

With that encouragement, we pulled clothes, shoes, books and other essentials out of the cupboard too, and stacked them in the next-door cupboard for future use. The book I had been reading, unfortunately, was on my bed. I'd been halfway through it, too.

When we'd finished, she closed the doors and opened them again. They now revealed a fridge, a selection of food (mostly in cans and packets), and a microwave and electric kettle.

"Whose is this stuff? Is it OK for us to take it?" asked Kevin.

Marie did the one-shoulder shrug which I was starting to recognise as one of her favourite gestures. "My experience is that whatever's behind the door is something I need. Not want, need. We need food. Whatever it is that decides what I need agrees on that."

"You don't think it's something you're doing?" I asked.

She controlled the start this time, but I could see she'd forgotten I was there again. "Well, it seems to only happen to me, but I don't choose where the doors go to."

"And it seems that you need us for something?" asked Kevin.

"Or maybe you needed me. That Mr Brown was about to get you, after all."

"Yeah, about that - what did he do exactly that spooked you?"

"It wasn't what he did exactly - he was just wrong. I've been in a lot of foster homes over the years, and there's a kind of feeling that I get sometimes about someone, I know I'm probably going to have to vanish through some doors quickly at times, you know? Or do you?"

We nodded. We knew foster homes and creepy people. It was easier for me than for Kevin, but he always knew where they were and had got good at avoiding them.

"It was like that, only a lot worse. He didn't seem totally - he was like someone who'd only heard about what humans were like, what they looked like and how their faces worked. Not quite - right."

"You think he was some kind of alien?" I asked.

"Or a robot, maybe?" said Kevin.

The little shrug. "Maybe. I didn't want to go where he was taking me, I know that much."

We started opening packets and getting ready for cooking, and while we did, I said, "Foster homes, huh? You too?"

"Yeah. I'm an orphan. Car crash, they told me, but I don't remember."

"Same with us. All of that. It seems like a bit of a coincidence."

"I dunno. A lot of people die in car crashes, don't they?"

"Yeah, which is why it makes a good cover story. Eaten by weasels, not so much."

She didn't quite laugh, but her lips quirked in a smile - more response than I usually got out of someone. "You two brothers?"

"Do we look like brothers?"

She coloured up a little. "Um, don't take this the wrong way..." She paused in the way I had learned meant "I've forgotten your name again." "John," I said.

"...John, but I find it hard to remember what you look like. Even when I'm looking straight at you."

"Oh, that," I said. "Yeah, that happens. Seems I interfere with that part of people's brains as well. Sorry - it's not something I can switch off."

"Me neither. I never know when I walk through a door if it's going to be one of those doors."

"It doesn't happen every time, then?" asked Kevin. "Should we chop these?" - meaning the carrots he had just got out.

"Yes, if we can find a knife. No, I don't travel every time I open a door, or maybe sometimes what I need is to be where the door normally leads to. But it happens... unexpectedly, sometimes."

"Mine's always on," he said. "Like, now I've talked to you for a few minutes, I could point straight to you wherever you were, out of sight, even miles away, probably. Useful in some ways, but it gets... noisy, in my head. It's good to be this far away from home, just to get the quiet."

"I wish I always knew where I was," she said wistfully.

We finished making the dinner in near silence.

The Y People, Chapter 2: Faint Signals

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sun, 17 May 2009 20:22:57 PDT

For a moment, I stood there with my mouth hanging open, then I leapt for Kevin at the same time as Marie. We bumped heads and bounced off each other. She looked straight at me - I suppose hitting your forehead on someone makes you notice them - and said, "You check that he's OK, I'm going to open a door."

I knelt down beside him and checked his breathing, which he still had some of. That was about all the first aid I remembered in the heat of the moment. Meanwhile, with the hand that wasn't clutching her bruise, Marie flung open the nearest door, the one we'd just come through. As I probably should have expected, it now led to a small sick bay with a cot (complete with blankets and pillow) and a large first aid kit on a shelf.

Kevin is bigger than either of us, and it took a determined effort from us both to haul him into the room and up onto the cot. I noticed a first aid manual in the kit and was just paging through the index looking for "fainting" when he stirred and moaned.

"Kevin," I said, "what happened, mate?"

He squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them wide. "Ow," he said. "Headache."

I fished some pain pills out of the kit and looked around to see that Marie had run a glass of water for him to take them with. He sipped and swallowed. His colour was rapidly improving.

"Not like you to pass out," I said.

"Nah," he said. "I think it's the distance. How far did you bring us, anyway?" he asked Marie. She shrugged with one shoulder, turning her hands up in the "who knows?" gesture.

"I don't pick the destinations," she said. "I don't even know where you guys are from. I'm guessing not Toronto." So she was Canadian.

"Auckland," he said. "New Zealand," I clarified.

"That's... a long way," she said. I noticed she was wearing a winter uniform, not a summer one. "I didn't know I could do that."

"Yeah, and we're a long way from there again," said Kevin. "I think that's why I passed out. My talent, knowing where things are? I think I... sort of reach out to them in my mind. When I'm away from school in the holidays, I can tell where people are and where the school is, but it's fainter, like a radio station that's based a long way away. Auckland is that way," he said, and pointed through a wall, not in the direction we'd come from, "but it's fainter than I've ever felt it."

"So, you kind of got disoriented?" I asked.

"Something like that. Your talent seems unaffected," he pointed out - Marie had just started again when I spoke. "She forgot you were here in what, twenty seconds?"

"Great," I said in a that's-not-great voice.

"Sorry," she said.

"Not your fault. I put out some kind of damper wave, I think. There's a part of the brain which people use to tell where things are, and if you damage it, you can still navigate round them but you're not conscious that they're there. I think I shut that part of the brain down in everyone except Kevin, but only for noticing me. They notice everything and everyone else."

"I always thought mine was just magic," she said, and turned back to Kevin. That's the other thing - people's tolerance for listening to me talk seems to stop after two or three sentences, at best.

"How are you feeling now?" she asked.

"Better," he said. "The headache's passing off. At risk of getting another one - can you tell us why you hurried us through the wardrobe like that?"

"That man," she said, "Mr Brown. He came for me as well. I actually went with him, too, but something didn't feel right, he wasn't answering any questions, and I opened a door and escaped."

"How long ago?"

"Yesterday."

"Where did you sleep?"

"I don't know, I opened a door and there was a bed." There was a certain element of "Haven't you got it yet?" in her tone.

"Must be convenient."

"Sometimes. I usually try to let other people open doors instead of me, though, because I don't want to suddenly end up somewhere else or have someone see and freak out."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," he said. We shared a reflective silence, reviewing various incidents in our minds - I was, anyway, and I assume they were too.

"OK," Kevin said after a while, "I think I'm all right now." He put his bare feet down on the floor and winced. "We'll need shoes if we're going to stay here. I think we must be back in the Northern Hemisphere." He stood up, a little cautiously, and took the two steps out the door - where he stumbled, and caught himself against the wall as he passed through.

"Wah," he said. "Mental compass just spun again. I don't think the sick bay is in the same building."

"Probably not," I said, "it looks abandoned here, and the sheets on the cot were fresh."

"That is one strange power you have," he said to Marie, but his tone was more respectful than complaining.

"What happens if we don't close the door?" I asked. "Do the people who own the sick bay now have a door that doesn't lead anywhere?"

Marie did her one-shoulder shrug again. "I always close them when I'm finished." She did so, and we stood in the dusty hall in front of a chipped plywood door that could lead anywhere in the world, as long as Marie was the one opening it. I shivered, not entirely from the cold - we were definitely in winter here.

"Come on," said Kevin, "let's poke around since we're here. Maybe you can open a door and find us some wooly socks."

"And a vacuum," she said, and sneezed. "And some food, and a microwave. It's dinnertime."

"It's ten in the morning," I said.

"Not in Toronto it isn't."

The Y People, Chapter 1: Entrances and Exits

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Tue, 19 May 2009 22:08:04 PDT

I was deep in a book, as usual, and didn't really pay attention when the door to our room opened and closed. But I looked up when Kevin, from the top bunk, said, "Looks like you're new here, but they should have told you - no girls in guys' rooms."

The girl was about our age, late teens, but small for it. She was slightly on the ordinary side of pretty, with shoulder-length hair of an indeterminate brown, and her school uniform - which wasn't our school's uniform - hung a little loose where other girls our age would be getting curves. She looked worried.

"Do you have special powers?" she asked him. She had to tilt her head back to look at him up there, and her accent was North American. (I can't tell a USAican from a Canadian unless they say "about".)

"What?", said Kevin.

"Do you have things you can do that are unusual? You do, don't you?"

"He knows where everything and everyone is," I said, and got the usual reaction people have when I speak - she gave a start, and looked at me wide-eyed.

"And people don't notice me," I added. Unnecessarily.

"I'm Marie," she said. "I open doors."

"That doesn't sound like much of a superpower," said Kevin.

"I open doors between where I am and where things are that I need," she said. "And right now I apparently need you guys."

"I'm flattered," said Kevin dryly. "There's a nun coming up the stairs, by the way, so keep your voice down. While you continue explaining," he added, when she didn't reply immediately.

"Nothing more to explain," she said, more quietly. "I opened the door to my room and it was the door to your room. Unfortunately my talent doesn't include knowing why I need the things I find, but it always turns out that I do."

"And I suppose you don't know whether we need to go with you or whether we should stay here?"

"Nope. That a closet? I sometimes find things out if I open closets," she said, and opened our wardrobe door.

Instead of assorted books, clothes, our slowly growing collection of camping gear and other such detritus, the door now led to the back of another cupboard - also full of books, but neatly arranged, multiple copies. They were textbooks, and we could hear the voice of Sister Mary Anselm, the principal.

"I'm sure that Sister Mary Martin will be back with the boys in no time, Mr Brown. So tell me more about this special programme they'll be going to. It isn't for gifted students, is it? Because Kevin is quite bright, but not exceptional, and, um, John..." She trailed off. I'm used to this. She couldn't actually remember anything about me, my academic record or even what I looked like. If asked to list the members of my class, she would inevitably leave me off, and so would Sister Mary Martin, who was our form teacher. If I stayed still and said nothing, Sister Mary Martin would probably not even remember she'd been sent to get two boys.

"No, it's just an opportunity for them to fulfill their full potential," said a man's voice, and Marie jumped and turned white.

She slammed the wardrobe door closed and opened it again. It now led somewhere dusty, ill-lit from high windows.

"You've got to come with me," she told us, not shouting, but forgetting to keep her voice down. "No arguments or questions, just come."

Something about her intensity convinced us. John leapt down off the top bunk, and I dropped my book and swung off the lower one. We were both barefooted, and we didn't pause to grab shoes, or anything else, we just dashed past Marie into what should have been a cluttered wardrobe a little deeper than our forearms, but was now clearly a long corridor in a run-down building we'd never seen before.

She hurried through after us and pulled the door closed. Beyond her, as the gap we'd come through narrowed, I saw the handle turning on our bedroom door - no doubt Sister Mary Martin, who Kevin had sensed on the stairs.

Kevin was looking around. He's tall and lanky and not actually athletic as such, but likes doing physical things, running round and throwing and catching. But he's not so good at it that he's in any school teams or anything, he just does it for fun. He has kind of a heavy face with big jawbones, and straight straw-coloured hair.

"Where are we?" he asked. He was taking it all pretty calmly on the outside, but I knew him well enough to know that he'd be freaking quietly out.

"No idea," said Marie, without apparent concern. "Where we need to be, I imagine."

Judging by the decor, we were in the premises of Bland and Company, Licensed Boring Merchants, and it had shut down some years ago after several decades of heavy daily use. Everything was dull colours (a different set of dull colours from the institutional dull colours our school was painted in, but from the same kind of imagination). The industrial linoleum floor was scuffed and dusty, the plastered walls cracked and dinged here and there, and a few of the high windows, which had that wire grid stuff embedded in the glass, were cracked as well. You couldn't see out them, but it seemed to be a dull day, which was funny because it had been sunny where we'd just left. I wondered how far we'd come.

John got that look he gets when he's trying to locate something or someone, kind of like his eyes go distant so he can see where they are. Then the blood drained out of his face and he collapsed messily to the floor.

The Y People: about to be serialized here

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Tue, 12 May 2009 16:24:39 PDT

I haven't written any fiction for a while, not since finishing Gu, almost six months ago. This is largely because I do fiction writing in my spare time and I haven't had much of it lately, what with one thing and another.

Of course if thousands of people started buying my books it would become part of my job, and then I would do it a lot more regularly.

Ahem. Anyway, I've been havering about where to serialize my next project, the YA novel The Y People - a new Blogger blog? On my C-Side Media site (would involve a new database and installing Wordpress and yada yada)? I finally just decided to serialize it here. I may shift it (and the other blogged material) to C-Side Media eventually, but for now, my resolution of my procrastination is to put it where I already have an (albeit small) audience.

I have the feeling that, as with Gu, if I just start writing it it will come. At the moment I have only a fuzzy idea of exactly what will happen - I let plot arise from character and sudden mad inspiration, I'm not one of those authors who meticulously plots a whole series in advance, which is only one of the differences between me and J.K. Rowling. But I know what happens in the first scene and some of the later scenes, and I know pretty much who my protagonists are, which is enough for me to get started.

Watch this space.

City of Masks on Smashwords

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 17:06:04 PDT

City of Masks is now available on Smashwords as an ebook. This means you can download it and read it in multiple formats, including Amazon Kindle, Sony Reader, Palm and iPhone (using Stanza).

I've set it to have the first half freely available and the second half available at a price you set (I think 99c US is the minimum). I'm reasonably confident that anyone who read the first half would pay at least a dollar to read the second half.

Authonomy again

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 16:09:21 PDT

If you've been putting off backing City of Masks on Authonomy, please, delay no longer. After an initial rapid rise up the rankings, it's starting to slowly slip back as activity around it dies. I'm appealing to you, who are already presumably fans, to show your support for it and help to give me a chance for commercial publication.

Thanks in advance.

City of Masks on Authonomy

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 16:35:18 PST

I mentioned in a previous post that I've been thinking about submitting City of Masks to a traditional publisher. I've discovered a way of doing this that is quite clever (of the publisher, not me). Harper-Collins has a site called Authonomy where unpublished or self-published authors like me can submit their books for the community of readers there to review, and the ones that are highest-rated get looked at for publication.

Why is this clever? Because it shows that Harper-Collins want to learn from the market rather than just guess what it wants (which is traditionally what publishers do), and they are invoking the "wisdom of crowds" in order to do so. Web 2.0, if you want to use a buzzword.

So I have put City of Masks on Authonomy. (Not the whole of it, about a third.)

Now, this next bit is important. If you've enjoyed City of Masks and would like to give something back at no cost to yourself, please go to the City of Masks page on Authonomy, get a login (it's quick and easy), and click the "Back the Book" link for City of Masks. This adds it to your "bookshelf" on the site. The more people add it to their bookshelf, the higher its rank. Every month, the highest-ranked books get considered for publication.

Other ways you can help it rise in the rankings:

Link to the City of Masks Authonomy page from your own blog or website.
Become more active on Authonomy and become known as someone who is good at spotting quality books (preferably before too many other people have spotted them). This gives your recommendation more weight.
Comment insightfully on City of Masks and other Authonomy books.

If all of that sounds too much, please, at a minimum, just sign up for Authonomy and add City of Masks to your bookshelf. That link again.

Thanks.

City of Masks "pirated"

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 13:55:00 PST

I just discovered (via a Google search) that the City of Masks ebook has been uploaded to Scribd, under an Attribution-Noncommercial Creative Commons license.

Now, in fact I have never released the ebook under any CC license. I have released the audio version (the podcast) as CC-Attribution-Noncommercial, but not the ebook. So I'm within my rights to complain to Scribd that this violates my copyright, and have it taken down.

I'm not going to do that, not right now, anyway, because I don't see that it's doing me any great harm (and it may do some good - someone may read it, like it, and seek out my other work here). I suppose for legal reasons I should say that I'm not giving up my legal rights by deciding not to exercise them at this time and on this occasion, blah blah.

City of Masks is in my copyright. I choose to distribute the ebook, from my own website, and not charge any money; I can do that because I own the copyright. I would prefer the file not to be uploaded elsewhere, because if it is on my own site I can control it. (Recently, for example, I put in a note at the end directing people here. I can't do that to the copy on Scribd.)

Technical ways to effectively prevent anyone at all with an internet connection taking the file and doing anything at all to it do not exist and never will, and I won't make life more annoying for honest people by implementing the ineffective ones that do exist. As I remarked above, at the moment I am also choosing not to pursue my legal ways to prevent this; it's just not worth it to me and I don't want to be the Copyright Ogre.

However, if you're thinking of uploading the file somewhere yourself, I have two words for you: Please don't.

Link to the copy on my site instead. Thanks.

The Y People

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:04:14 PST

I now have a tentative working title for my YA novel: The Y People. Y for Young, and also Generation Y, and also because they're wondering "Why?". There's also a reference, naturally, to the X-Men. With a small nod to The Tomorrow People, a British sci-fi series of which I watched a few episodes as a child.

There's a problem with it, though. My concept was to set it starting in an orphanage/school - all the kids are orphans and they assemble from three different orphanages/boarding schools, probably Catholic. I was thinking of making the actual country somewhat vague - never mentioning the name of the city, for example - underlining how world cities are increasingly interchangeable and youth culture is increasingly international.

The problem is (at least, it's a problem for my novel idea; I'm sure it's a good thing overall) that in the west, orphanages basically don't exist any more, let alone ones which are also schools. Which leaves me with several choices:

Set it in a non-Western country, or in the past (which is also, we're reliably informed, another country). This would involve doing research, and research isn't fun for me in the same way that just making things up is.
Just ignore the problem and say that it's an alternate world where there are still orphanages like that. After all, every work of fiction creates an alternate world. But this would make me look ill-informed or lazy (and the latter, while true, isn't generally admired).
Change my concept. If I do, though, I'll probably need to incorporate foster parents of some sort, however distant and uninvolved - even boarding school students go home for the summer. This is probably the solution I'll use.

Until I settle this, I'm reluctant to start, even though I have some character concepts:

John is the narrator. His unusual ability is that nobody ever notices him unless he deliberately draws attention to himself. He uses this ability to cut class and read in the library instead, meaning that he has a wide general knowledge and vocabulary but has skipped significant portions of the usual school curriculum. His abiding issue is that he keeps being overlooked and forgotten about.
Kevin is John's roommate. His unusual ability is that once he is familiar with a person or object he always knows exactly where he, she or it is relative to his location. This means that he is the only person who is consistently aware that John is in the room. However, in the boarding school context where there are hundreds of familiar people moving round him all the time, he finds the stimulus annoying at times. His issue is that he is more inclined to observe than to act or even interact.
Marie is from a different location than John and Kevin. Her talent is that when she opens a door she will always find what she needs on the other side. At the start of the story, this is John and Kevin. She is rather too used to having everything she needs and has poor impulse control (although she only finds things she needs, not necessarily things she wants, and she doesn't always know why she needs them).
Jane is a tinkerer. Any device she spends time around, and particularly any device she builds herself, does whatever it does only more so - a cellphone becomes a telepathic projector, a computer is able to search information that isn't on any website. Her issue is that she doesn't understand people very well and thinks they should work better than they do.

Laying it out like that, the initial impetus is definitely coming from Marie, isn't it? She kicks the whole thing off, and everyone else reacts to her. We'll know they're getting their issues sorted out when they initiate positive courses of action themselves without, or despite, Marie.

Reviews

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 14:55:04 PST

Happy New Year. Just thought I'd alert you to Goodreads, which is a great social site for people who enjoy books. You can rate and review books, discuss them in groups, see what your friends are reading and so forth.

City of Masks is on Goodreads, and I'd love to get some reviews. You can also "friend" me and compare books with me - probably best if you rate or review City of Masks first, so that I don't just think you're spamming me.

Preorders open for Changing Health Behaviours

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 11:44:53 PST

It's the end of the year - time to finish projects.

I know you came here for the fiction, so I'll be brief in mentioning that my non-fiction project Changing Health Behaviours is now available for preorder at a special preorder price of $17.50 (NZD), until 31 December 2008, when the price will rise.

Preorder books will be personally signed by me. Along with the book you get 20 hypnotherapy tracks on MP3 CD.

You can find out full details on my hypnotherapy and health blog.

Gu is finished (sort of), and future projects

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:08:11 PST

I've just posted the last episode of Gu, so if you were waiting until it was finished to start reading, the first episode is here.

I have several candidates for a next project. I thought about running a poll here, but I may just start them all and let people vote with their feed subscriptions (or continue working on the one I feel like working on at the time). This is one nice thing about not having a publishing contract.

Speaking of which, I keep going back and forth over whether to submit City of Masks to a conventional publisher or not. Sales of the self-published book have been disappointing, considering the number of subscribers I've had over at Podiobooks and the positive comments I've been getting. Not that I'm in it for the money (and not that you get much from a conventional publisher unless you're in the top tier anyway), but wider distribution would possibly be a good thing.

If you have strong opinions one way or the other, please post a comment here. Thanks.

Getting back to future projects, I have three main candidates at the moment. In no particular order:

Up the Line, a science fiction novel in the same setting as Gu (which I'm perhaps inevitably thinking of as the Guniverse). This is the one with the White Star Order chaplain at the bottom of the space elevator and the United Nations inspector up in orbit, and is largely about the people they meet - refugees, migrants, opportunists and other everyday quirky characters. It doesn't focus on engineering in any way at all.
A currently untitled Young Adult novel (meaning that the protagonists are young adults; this seems to be what makes a novel YA). The premise is that these YAs are orphans, they have strange abilities, and they don't know why, or why a sinister man in a brown coat is pursuing them. Since I don't know exactly why yet either, we can all find out together.
An also untitled, and possibly more "commercial", novel in a low-magic fantasy setting. It may be very low magic indeed, almost deniable magic, in fact. Premise: Insecure female thief infiltrates castle in search of loot, gets caught up in plot of sinister fanatic, finds herself forcibly married to the rightful lord of the castle as part of this plot, which involves having her bear the lord a controllable heir so that said lord can be killed off and the fanatic can control the supposed power site in the castle. She's not having this, and he's a decent man (if rather scholarly) who refuses to rape her despite threats of torture, so they escape together into the wilderness, pursued by, um, pursuers of some sort. Personal growth and, eventually, romance ensue, followed by justice against the would-be usurper.

I suppose I'm in the market for title suggestions, as well, aren't I?

It's funny. I can come up with great titles for which the stories just won't come, and vice versa, but seldom both at once. I mean to say, "Gu"?

Wordling

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 14:34:57 PDT

I've been playing with Wordle, a Net toy which takes any text and produces an attractive "word cloud" based on the frequency of particular words in the text. The layout and colours are purely decorative.

Here's this blog, demonstrating that I say "actually" too much (I knew that, actually):

Here's my Gu novel blog, demonstrating that it isn't about technology at all, it's actually about people:

Here's the text of City of Masks, the novel. Corius is clearly the main character:

And the City of Masks storygame, which is indeed about Face:

Click any of the thumbnails to see a large version.

Life Leverage: my new nonfiction project

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 14:09:41 PDT

I pay the bills with IT support, and I write novels because I love it, but I'm also building up a practice as a hypnotherapist and health coach because I find that very fulfilling and want to make it my career.

Over at my Hypno NZ site I've just announced Life Leverage: Simple techniques to improve your health and wellbeing.

The project is a book-and-CD combo, with the hypnotherapy tracks on the CD supporting the lifestyle changes that the book talks about making.

I've created a mailing list where you can sign up for updates on this and my other hypnotherapy-related projects, such as audio recordings and videos. The idea is to assess demand so that I can decide what kind of a print-and-distribution model to adopt.

If health is a topic that interests you, please take a look. I try to stay on the scientific end of the health advice spectrum and make sure that my recommendations are well supported, but at the same time treat human beings as human beings and not squishy machines.

The City of Masks storygame

masks@csidemedia.com (Mike Reeves-McMillan) — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 17:58:59 PDT

One of my excuses for delaying publication of City of Masks was, for a while, the City of Masks storygame. I was going to include it in the book, but I eventually realized that while the novel was finished, the game was still a work in progress and likely to remain so for the foreseeable future.

So, what's a storygame? Like any term, the definition is argued about passionately (notably on the Story-Games forum, where I hang out under the handle MikeRM). My own definition is that it's a game which is designed to produce a story. The game elements guide and influence the story elements and vice versa, so that you end up with a story that you wouldn't (or couldn't) have just sat down and made up in the form it eventually attained. It's also, almost always, a group activity, like most games, so you get the interaction of multiple creative minds.

Storygames are descended from (and usually also are) roleplaying games, which themselves have only been around for a little over 30 years, so it's a new and exciting medium, and people are coming up with great innovations.

The Scandinavians, for example, are doing some interesting things with their "Jeepform" games, which are quite constrained scenarios within which a group collectively improvises a story - like improv theatre, but with more definition upfront.

In the English-speaking world, one of the emerging masters of the storygames form is Jason Morningstar, who has just won the prestigious Diana Jones Award (shared with another winner) for his game Grey Ranks. In Grey Ranks, you play Boy Scouts and Girl Guides in World War II Warsaw during the Warsaw Uprising - dealing with all the usual teenage problems, plus fighting Nazis who have invaded your city.

Some other prominent current storygames:

My Life with Master: You are Igor-like minions of an evil master. By making connections of love with the townsfolk, who are oppressed by Master, you can overcome your weariness and self-loathing enough to kill Master on their behalf. It's about getting out of abusive relationships, basically.

Primetime Adventures: You are the cast and writers of a TV show, one with an ensemble cast that focuses on the characters’ stories and their development as people. You plan and then play out a series of shows.

Breaking the Ice: You are two would-be lovers. You play out the ups and downs of the couple's first three dates.

Dogs in the Vineyard: You are “God’s Watchdogs”, in a setting loosely based on pre-statehood Mormon Utah, and you must protect the towns of the Faithful from the consequences of sin and heresy. It is up to you how far you go – but using violence will have consequences.

A Thousand and One Nights: You play members of the Sultan's Court, whiling away the sultry nights by telling pointed stories to advance your own ambitions. Navigate the social maze and you could win your heart's desire; offend the wrong person and you suffer the Sultan's wrath.

Sons of Liberty: To quote the game's creator, "Have you ever had Alexander Hamilton wind up your clockwork power armor, jump out of Thomas Paine's ornithopter, and land in the middle of the Battle of Yorktown to punch General Cornwallis in the face? No? Well... would you like to? Take on the role of the Founding Fathers to kick ass and take names for truth, justice, and the American way in the only Roleplaying Game of Freedom and Badassery. The game's fast-paced card mechanics ensure high-action madness and revolutionary heroics. If you are playing Benjamin Franklin and you aren't swinging an electrified kite over your head to clear the streets of redcoats, then you are playing it wrong."

The Story-Games site has a codex which will tell you about many other games.

So - the City of Masks storygame. It uses cards (ordinary playing cards) and dominoes (mainly because of the association with domino masks, I have to admit; you can substitute ordinary 6-sided dice if you don't have a set of dominoes). You play young nobles in Bonvidaeo, the City of Masks, who are just entering the adult world with its intrigues and plots. It takes place about 50 years before the events of the novel so that you won't bump up against any of the characters or events.

The reason I mention it now is that I've been approached by someone who wants to run it, at the storygames meetup known as the Nerdly Beach Party. This takes place at the San Simeon State Park in California on September 19-21. So if you can get there then and are interested in playing a game in the setting of City of Masks, here's your chance.

Edit: the City of Masks game is scheduled for Friday 19th.