What I'm (sort of, more or less) working on...

I have three irons in the fire right now, Senor Bill:

Iron #1: I'm co-editing a story collection which will benefit the Robert E. Howard House and Museum and the organization that runs it, Project Pride. The anthology is comprised of stories written by current and ex-members of REHupa, a hermetic and strange Amateur Press Association to which I belong (I just love to collect decoder rings, I guess). At this stage, I'm reading and re-reading corrected stories and poems as they are turned in and slowly, painfully working up a manuscript.

Iron #2: I'm writing another Sailor Tom Sharkey story--this one is called "Sailor Tom Sharkey and the Phantom of the Gentleman Farmer's Commune," for reasons that I will not even attempt to explain right now. This will be the fourth Tom Sharkey story I've written and not sold (though one of them will end up in the above anthology through editorial divine right). Once I get to five such written and unsold stories, I will evaluate the wisdom of writing any more and whether or not I've scratched that particular itch.

Iron #3: I am working on a pitch to Dark Horse for a one-shot story for Conan. There. I said it. And I'm doing it. Something I swore I'd never say or do. Look for that in our group email sometime early next week, before I send it out.

This is in addition to waiting to hear back from another publisher about a Tom Sharkey story I have out in the world right now, and also waiting to hear back about a pitch I sent in many moons ago. Over the Christmas holiday, I'm going to outline that idea I told you about (the guy in the domino mask), and see if I can't make it a 30-day novel to work on over at cwsb.net. I've picked up a terrific pile of research on The Assassins.