Giveaway and Guest Post The Remnant by Roland Allnach

Title: Remnant
Author: Roland Allnach
Genre: Sci Fi
Publisher: All Things That Matter Press
Release Date: November 11 2010


A stirring, thought provoking anthology of three novellas within the speculative/science fiction genres. The stories are linked in theme by characters seeking self- truth, redemption, and their moral center.   The novellas, in order ofappearance, are: “All the Fallen Angels”, in which a convicted war criminal attempts to make peace with his past; “Enemy, I Know You Not”, in which a military officer that was captured and tortured tries to find his loyalty in an abyss of suspected betrayals; and “Remnant”, in which the survivor of a global pandemic is confronted with the prospect of making peace with hismemories when other survivors attempt to bring him back from self-imposed isolation.

His hands slide down to lay on his thighs as he looked back to the mug of tea.

He sat for some time, alone, in the dark, his eyes burning. He pushed

the com away, his arm holding a moment before he settled his hand in his lap. He rested back in his chair, gazed out the portal to the emptiness of space, and took a sip of tea.

A shrug, slight and almost involuntary, pulled at his shoulders.

***

He blinked, coming to his senses at the sound of snapping fingers. His eyes darted about to place him in his usual pub within the engineering section of the inter-system shipping nexus where his freighter was docked. He looked across the regular customers until his eyes fell on the man sitting across from him.

“Hey, Jansing, you still with me?”

Stohko looked at the man for a moment. He glanced down at the beer mug he realized he held in his hand. He looked back at the man across from him. “My credit’s good, Piccolo.”

Piccolo rubbed his beard, a grin seizing him as he lounged back in his seat. He was a dock foreman, but he was also a marketeer, and despite Stohko’s reliance on him, Stohko held no illusion about Piccolo’s nature. “You know, I like you Stohko,” Piccolo said, but sighed as he opened his hands on the table. “It’s just this stuff you need, you know, it’s not in my regular catalog of goods. That means I have to have it brought in special, and special considerations, well, that means special costs. If it wasn’t some exotic designer thing, it would be different, but being that I have to have it made, well, you understand. There’s only so much consideration I can give a former Navy man.”

Stohko stared at him. “My credit is good,” he said again.

Piccolo’s grin faded to a crooked frown. “Is it? I hear your business is real soft lately.”

Stohko’s eyes narrowed on Piccolo. “I know you have the pills.” Piccolo’s face settled. “I like you.” His eyes wandered over the black

ceiling before settling back on Stohko. “Tell you what: I have a little job for you—do it, and I’ll extend your credit.”

Balancing Act!!!! Managing Writing With Everyday Life.

by Roland Allnach, author of ‘Remnant’ and ‘Oddities & Entities’

The life of an author can be quite exciting.  Beyond the obvious thrill of writing new books and stories, the author also gets to enjoy the more social aspects of the writing life through the ongoing exercise of promotion.  Interviews, blog posts, social media, websites, virtual book tours - they all have two things in common.  One, they are indispensable tools in an author’s marketing kit.  Two, they consume a great deal of time.

Ah yes, Time.  Like many authors, I abide by the reality of today’s publishing world, which is to say that my efforts as an author do not yet serve to support me (or my family) in the current economy.  Long story short, I have a ‘real’ job in addition to my career as an author.

Every author faces a time challenge, regardless of the author’s position in life.  Authors, like any other group of people, represent a cross section of society.  Some are young, some work multiple jobs, some are retired, and some have children or grandchildren.  The specifics aren’t really that important.  As human beings it’s within our nature to fill up our time with things that are personally important to us, so regardless of one’s station in life, time will be tight.

So, how does an author find the time to not only write, but to promote his or her writing?  It’s tempting in the excitement of a new or upcoming publication to want to dive in head first, but balance is crucial.  Trying to lead a one dimensional life is not only a recipe for failure but also for unhappiness.

Writing is my passion, but I have a family, and they come first.  I also have a job.  Without that income, everything else is in jeopardy.  Without my family’s emotional support and encouragement, everything else is a hollow exercise.  Without my writing, I feel I’m failing my own aspirations.  I manage these considerations by planning as much as I can.  Being organized is critical.  I budget everything, from the amount of time I sleep to the amount of time I work on my writing, to the time I spend with my family to enjoy my life with them.  

It’s a balanced approach, and while it sometimes feels that I’m not making progress on any front, I make steady progress on several fronts.  I try to multi-task by making plans with concurrent incubation times.  My aim is to always have something in the works, whether it’s waiting on a review, waiting on an award contest, or prepping some promotion plans.  As with all things, persistence is an author’s most reliable ingredient for success.  With a little planning, I can even accommodate Life’s unexpected moments, or adjust things to prioritize something that requires more immediate attention.  It’s not too much different than a game of whack-a-mole.

Authors have to find their individual balance to manage their time.  It’s not an easy life to pursue, and the writing life requires fortitude for long waits on submission replies, countless hours invested in writing and editing, a skin thick enough to weather criticism and rejection, and the confidence and conviction to push through moments when it all seems quite the impossible dream to make true.  But, with every little morsel of success, it’s worth all the effort. 

I couldn’t imagine my life any other way.  

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Roland Allnach has been writing since his early teens, first as a hobby, but as the years passed, more as a serious creative pursuit.  He's an avid reader, with his main interests residing in history, mythology, and literary classics, along with some fantasy and science fiction in his earlier years.

By nature he has a do-it-yourself type of personality, and his creative inclinations started with art and evolved to the written word.

Since making the decision to pursue a career as an author, he's secured publication for a number of short stories, received a nomination for inclusion in the Pushcart Anthology, built his own website, and in November 2010 realized publication for an anthology of three novellas, titled Remnant, from All Things That Matter Press, followed in 2012 by his second anthology, Oddities & Entities, also from All Things That Matter Press. Both books have gone on to receive a number of national awards, including National Indie Excellence Awards, Readers Favorite Book of the Year Awards, and USA Book News Best Book Awards.

His writing can best be described as depicting strange people involved in perhaps stranger situations. He prefers to let his stories follow their own path. His writing is sometimes speculative, other times supernatural, at times horror, with journeys into mainstream fiction, and even some humor- or perhaps the bizarre. Despite the category, he aims to depict characters as real on the page as they are in his head, with prose of literary quality. His literary inspirations are as eclectic as his written works - from Poe to Kate Chopin, from Homer to Tolkien, from Flaubert to William Gibson, from Shakespeare to Tolstoy, as long as a piece is true to itself, he's willing to go along for the ride. He hopes to bring the same to his own fiction.

Places to find Roland 

Facebook

Goodreads

Website

Places to find Remnant 

Amazon

Autographed Print Copies 

Barnes and Noble 

Goodreads