Why Did I Publish Sortmind?

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

Sortmind trade paperback from AmazonTrantor Group CEO Peter Trantor scrambles to reassure his latest client, the lovely but unreadable bank executive Anna Winstead, that his telepathic Sortmind app really isn’t as deadly as people assume. But he has some explaining to do when a newly-hired programmer at Trantor, Mindwiped by Sortmind abuse, proclaims himself an alien from the planet Cnzaar.

Given that I think this novel is so good, why did I publish it myself and not consider submitting it to royalty publishers?

  1. Sortmind is the last of my older novels that needed reboot and psychic repair; many of these stretched back decades to my first powerful but unformed urges for fiction, and this completion/destiny/fate mood runs through all the other reasons below. As I indicated in Sortmind’s first blog post, this final version has definitely answered some karma, and made the older effort current and central to my writing. Its publication marks the end of a cycle beginning in November 2006, not a little marked by anxiety, of reassessing the entirety of my writing career, my methods, and my goals.
  2. So it was time to put the novel out there, and I wasn’t going to wait for years of submissions and publishers’ schedules. Call that impatience, but it just had to happen this way. Somehow February 2019 was the perfect time to release the book.
  3. There is also the idea that anything related to tech should come out fast, or else it will be out of date by the time a normal publication schedule can process it. The tech in Sortmind isn’t highly detailed, nor is it anything approaching hard science fiction, but still I wouldn’t want to end up putting the novel back on the operating table and addressing technical issues in say, 2024.
  4. During the 1990’s I’d sent dozens of query letters to publishers for Sortmind’s original version; I was just not going to fool with it again. There remains the concept of submitting this novel or any self-published work to publishers someday, but right now, I have no interest.
  5. The urge for “total artistic control” has asserted itself throughout the entire reboot of Sortmind–the new plot, the redeveloped characters, the final manuscript, the cover.
  6. Now there’s a new relation of Sortmind the novel to the Sortmind the website, Sortmind the blog, and Sortmind Press. When the idea came to me in July 1999 to register the sortmind.com domain, I hadn’t exactly abandoned the novel, but it was on indefinite hold; I just liked the syllables so much that I wanted them for the website. When I began building the site I had no thought of doing much more than having a page for the novel and some character images. Despite an earnest but cosmetic 2010 revamp, the novel soon sank deeper into the ice of neglect even as I began a Sortmind blog and Sortmind Press.
  7. I can agree that it looks a little silly to have Sortmind the novel published by Sortmind Press and hawked on sortmind.com, blog.sortmind.com, and press.sortmind.com, but this too feels like destiny/karma. Sure, Sortmind Press is a bit problematic; while I’m not sure I’ll ever expand it into a real publishing house, I now have four novels and a picture book for sale there.
  8. To add to the confusion we have the 1988 painting Sortmind, executed while I was running hot on the first draft, confidently churning through its ever-expansive 1,075 pages.

 

Sortmind, the painting copyright 1988 by Michael D. Smith

Sortmind, the painting

copyright 2019 by Michael D. Smith

Sortmind the Novel – More Information

Sortmind Press

Mass market paperback from lulu.com

 

A Terrible New Enemy – Review of The Wounded Frontier

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

The Wounded Frontier by Michael D. SmithAfter the collapse of the Grid, the vast collective mind of the Alpha Centaurians, humans and Martians in the United System Space Force now find themselves included in a new Grid, one they are told is completely voluntary, but who believes that? This book begins with Jack Commer and his crew embroiled in the nasty climate of resistance and hostility that accompanies widespread change. Called out for their dark histories, vilified and threatened by haters and the establishment, the crew escapes with their lives as they attempt to embark on an important mission to investigate an anomaly in a distant but familiar star system.

Following is the sort of mayhem at which this author excels: bickering, confusion, shock as everything that can go wrong, does, complete with crashing, exploding and vanishing ships, domestic disputes, and questionable solutions, all hanging under the shadow of a vast, unassailable sphere that no one understands. Add in a couple of ancient but expertly retrofitted human robots in the form of Draka Sortie, the suspiciously appointed President of the United System Council; and Jack’s most talented engineer, Laurie Lachrer, and things get even worse, bringing to bear the author’s penchant for smug, obnoxious villains you love to hate.

These books have a great, campy 70s scifi vibe — but without the cheesy special effects: the high tech is well done, sophisticated and interesting. The robots do an alarming amount of damage before the crew figures out what’s going on, and by then it’s too late. Now under the control of an alien race called the Wounded that devours star systems for the energy rush, our heroes must find a way to outsmart the Wounded’s robotic henchmen before the demise of both the Sol and Alpha Centaurian star systems. The conclusion, characteristically wild and unexpected, involves some fallen companions and a mythical dimension where space warriors go after death, no less, making for yet another fun read.

by F. T. McKinstry, author of the Chronicles of Ealiron series

The Wounded Frontier, Book Five of the Jack Commer Series – Background

Sortmind Publication – What You Need to Know

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

Sortmind. a novel by Michael D. SmithSortmind, the Novel

published February 2016 by Sortmind Press

eBook:
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Smashwords

paperback:
Amazon (trade)
lulu.com (mass market)

The Overview

Trantor Group CEO Peter Trantor scrambles to reassure his latest client, the lovely but unreadable bank executive Anna Winstead, that his telepathic Sortmind app really isn’t as deadly as people assume. But he has some explaining to do when a newly-hired programmer at Trantor, Mindwiped by Sortmind abuse, proclaims himself an alien from the planet Cnzaar.

High school art students Oliver Perrine, a survivor of the terrorist bombing of the downtown library, and Sam Emersonn, coolly pragmatic and politically aware, struggle to define themselves against their fascist fathers, the founders of the reviled Citizens Against Telepathy, as its soldiers engage in street battles with its rival, the fanatic Open Telepathy Foundation.

OIiver Perrine copyright 1988 by Michael D. Smith

Oliver Perrine

Architect and reluctant CAT political activist Mitchell Emersonn telepathically reviews his girlfriend Shelley’s files after she too declares she’s an alien from Cnzaar. A library clerk invents hallucinogenic Concentrated Telepathic Tablets and spreads them to the Canterra Art Institute, where Sam and Oliver consume the drug and find themselves confronting Sortmind’s unnerving redefinition of reality.

Sam’s fifteen-year-old sister Teresa discovers she’s a secret link between generations of mystical artists, and that she and Oliver belong to a clandestine society of Tree Leopards. But two opposing sets of aliens alternately kidnap Oliver, each pleading for the impenetrable Tree Leopard Society to assist in their war against each other. Frenzied militias attack the Trantor Building’s Sortmind servers and the app begins evaporating, leaving Oliver to sort out his adolescent fantasies and discover what’s real. Continue reading →

Harray Andreall’s Wedding Night, July 1975

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by
Harray Andreall copyright 2017 by Michael D. Smith

A cinder block falls on Akard Drearstone’s head and he trades his print shop job for lead guitar. Months later, as the four members of the Akard Drearstone Group face the onslaught of national fame, Akard decides to throw a demented wedding reception at his rural Texas commune to honor manager Harray Andreall. But on the way to the commune Harray fights with his bride, the Exponentialist philosopher Michelle Morgan, in front of two hundred guests at the Austin airport.

“Dammit, keep quiet, bitch! Everyone’s gonna think we’re assholes!”

“Ah, fuck you, jerk!” Michelle wrenched open a glass door and stomped away.

“You can’t call yourself mindful!” Harray screamed after her. “You’ll never be able to call yourself mindful!”

She was gone, mixing into a group of well-wishers. Harray went to a public phone and opened the Yellow Pages to Electrical Contractors. Damn, it was bad again tonight. But maybe he should try to keep up with the feeling this time. Retain his calmness, his complete lack of mood.

Like, the Buddhists said that the true disciple attended to the path without getting hung up on being the disciple. In a way that described Harray perfectly. He’d never made the mistake of taking this mindfulness meditation seriously. He just used it where necessary. And that made him a true disciple, a monk of the path, didn’t it?

So Harray had a responsibility to himself and to the universe to make sure Michelle’s petty anger didn’t prevail. He might be damn depressed, but he could still observe, still let karma work itself out.

But he regarded the dull people moving through the terminal and sighed. It was hopeless. Two hundred losers heading off to one more party to distract themselves, to act out their same asshole karma over and over again … and he knew this was what Buddhism was all about. All is suffering.

But the Buddhists saw the suffering and got some sort of cosmic perspective out of it, whereas Harray’s stupid depressions led nowhere. He shuddered to think of all the trivial crap he performed like a machine every day, never grasping any of it. No matter how much he watched his damn breathing, did he ever get any cosmic perspective? Shit, no! Maybe it was time to blow off a little steam. Maybe there wouldn’t be any cosmic perspective, but Harray could still work himself into a damn good snit. He could overwhelm a roomful of plastic partygoers with one of his foul moods, and it would serve them right.  His despair would show them just how miserable their own lives truly were.

Akard Drearstone by Michael D. Smith

Deeper into that same night, contemplating the dissolution of his hours-long marriage, Harray finds a dead body packed in ice on the second floor of the commune barn. Though he tries to convince the sullen members of the group that their musical experiment is worth continuing, Harray’s boss gets arrested on murder charges, the record company veers towards collapse, and Harray is dumbfounded to discover a second killing perpetuated by another band he manages.

copyright 2019 by Michael D. Smith

Akard Drearstone – more info

Free Akard Drearstone, Soul Institute, First Twenty Steps

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

The Smashwords End of Year Sale starts December 25 and runs through January 1. During this time my three titles from Sortmind Press will be free from the Smashwords site (links below). You can download Akard Drearstone, The Soul Institute, and The First Twenty Steps in numerous eBook formats including EPUB, mobi (Kindle), PDF, and more.

The Soul Institute by Michael D. Smith

The Soul Institute

Computer technician Himal Steina realizes his dream of a mythic return to the sanctuary of a vast foggy university of Soul when he’s appointed writer in residence at the Soul Institute and falls in love with one of its numerous faculty goddesses.

Akard Drearstone by Michael D. Smith

Akard Drearstone

At their Texas commune in May 1975, the four members of the Akard Drearstone Group begin to feel the onslaught of national fame as twelve-year-old Jan Pace, daughter of a commune couple, falls in love with the narcissistic, paranoid bassist Jim Piston.

The First Twenty Steps by Michael D. Smith

The First Twenty Steps

The motorcycle attack on the Dataflux computer building turns terrifying and surreal as ex-con Harry finds himself outgunned by a rival biker gang. Can his enemies really be protecting spaceship navigational equipment?

Copyright 2018 by Michael D. Smith

The Soul Institute by Michael D. Smith
Akard Drearstone by Michael D. Smith
The First Twenty Steps by Michael D. Smith

Ronan of Space (The Falkrow Narratives Book 3), by Kara D. Wilson – Review

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

Ronan of Space by Kara D. WilsonThough Rhys Falkrow, now grown to full adulthood, still figures prominently in this final book of the Falkrow Narratives and links the three novels together, his seventeen-year-old son Ronan now takes center stage and matures through a series of fast-paced adventures.

The setting is a future Earth, unrecognizable to us, which long ago devolved into pre-industrial cultures alien to, and warring with, each other.  Books 1 and 2 describe how a young Rhys was flung here years ago as a refugee from the disintegrating spaceship of the advanced Caelestis race, and how he learned to survive on this primitive Earth, make contact with its different cultures, and eventually assume a leadership role.  But in seeking to shield his son Ronan from the high tech, collective mindset of Caelestis, Rhys has kept Ronan in ignorance of his heritage and has more or less abandoned him and Ronan’s mother Kallen.  As Book 3 opens Ronan is little more than an angry juvenile delinquent.  If Rhys was always set outside both the future primitive Earth as well as the world of Caelestis, which disowned him years ago, Ronan is even further outside both, never really belonging to Earth culture nor ever aware of his Caelestis heritage.  Though Rhys’ goal was to let his son know what it was to be fully human, he’s set up conditions that have blocked Ronan from truly understanding himself.

Secrets have been kept from Ronan, and he resents it.  Yet the truth cannot long be denied when Rhys, now commander of Caelestis military operations in Earth orbit, announces emergency evacuations in the face of invasion by the Alphas, a race of evolved humanoids who are eighty percent artificial, function as a computerized hive mind, and wield technology far beyond anything Caelestis has seen.  The Alphas are here to exploit Earth resources, but the descriptions of their schemes are no science fiction cliché: the author posits methods of harvesting our planet which are an unforgettable nightmare.

As Ronan begins to numbly absorb the new developments and his connection to Caelestis, astounding native talents start welling within him, and he’s propelled into the heart of a danger he was never prepared for.  He shares impulsive qualities and leadership skills with his father but, perhaps because of his isolation, before long he begins to transcend his father’s somewhat narrow views of the possibilities the crisis offers.  His eventual contact with a rebellious Alpha, Cassius, completely redefines the nature of the human/Alpha conflict; the ways Ronan and Cassius establish a basis for communication and learn to respect each other set a fascinating cornerstone of this book.

As with Ms. Wilson’s previous two books in the series, Rhys of Earth and Rhys of Quadrant Six, the author’s storytelling skills make a long narrative unfold effortlessly, as imaginative scenes and fresh plot easily pull the reader through an intriguing story.  Nothing is extraneous; there are no unnecessary detours.  The ending is psychologically satisfying and concludes the series well, but we are free to picture Ronan expanding ever further in the future.

review by Michael D. Smith

Ronan of Space at Amazon

Balloon Ship Armageddon, Part 3 – Jack Commer’s Arc

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

Spacemen, Novel, Earth copyright 2018 by Michael D. SmithIt’s not time for a final assessment of the Jack Commer, Supreme Commander series, but after completing the first draft of the seventh and (probably) last book, I’m beginning to reflect on the long journey from The Martian Marauders to Balloon Ship Armageddon. Space captain Jack Commer has been with me since September 1962, first appearing in four of the thirty-four science fiction stories in my fifth grade Blue Notebook. He and his three brothers then starred in my first attempt at a novel, Spring 1964’s Trip to Mars, and then the unfinished eighth grade draft of The Martian Marauders, a book which I happily rediscovered, completed and rewrote as a modern novel decades later.

I refrained from sprinkling self-serving promotional links into the above paragraph, but we need to get them out of the way or else I’ll have to repeat all that content here.

A Writing Biography, Part II: The Blue Notebook
Trip to Mars in Paperback
The Irregular Origin of the Martian Marauders

The idea for a seventh book to conclude the series originated with Jack’s wife Amav’s declaration at the end of Book Six, The SolGrid Rebellion, that she and Jack ought to mount a search for their traitorous son Jonathan James, who’s just been rendered into a million pieces of jagged glass by a Martian shattergun but, still alive, has been reconstituted as one-third of a solid chromium pyramid. Apparently Jonathan James is heading to a star thirty-four light years away to seek assistance from the deadly Wounded race of artistic exterminators Jack has been battling for the last two books. But there was no plot beyond that, which Jack and Amav both lamented in their blog interviews with me this spring.

I’m not killing off main characters in Seven, or otherwise making an Eight impossible, as, who knows, I may want to compose Eight a few decades from now. I think I’ll relax more working on this novel if I leave this option open. The thought of permanently abandoning some characters like Dar or Kner or Suzette Borman is hard. Worse is the idea of merely tossing them into the seventh book to “resolve them all” as Heinlein did to his galaxy of characters at the end of The Number of the Beast–very tired writing there.

It may be that you’re doing yourself a favor by not writing sequels and returning to the same characters. The often-delivered line from authors, “And then the characters spoke to me and told me their story wasn’t over,” etc. etc., could also be a way of staying comfortable with an arts-and-crafts level of consciousness. Consider Dostoyevsky exploring many of the same themes in new books but always extending them with fresh characters and plot; dynamic beings like Raskolnikov, Rogozhin, or Dmitri Karamazov may share similar forces, but they have wholly unique life stories behind them.

Am I writing fan fiction of my own work? Easy to grab onto Kirk and Spock and run with them, eh?

Continue reading →

Balloon Ship Armageddon, Part 2 – Problematic Composition

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

Ranna Kikken Commer in 2076 copyright 2018 by Michael D. Smith

Ranna Kikken Commer in 2076

I felt disconcertingly cold towards Balloon Ship Armageddon, both during its writing and in the week after finishing it, until I wrote the previous blog post on its origins, including a silly overblown synopsis. At once I felt a strong new connection to the novel, and a desire to fully feel what it means to end the Jack Commer series. The composition of the book has had its ups and downs, including the realization that I’ll probably have to eventually self-publish it. (Unsure of that yet–more later.) Though novel forces did channel themselves into the writing sessions, much as they’ve always done, I’ve also felt distant from the book during a time of several stressful interruptions from daily life. Unconscious energies seem to have pushed this story in certain directions I hadn’t planned, but in retrospect I welcome them all.

Selected observations written from February 19th through October 6th will now take over in a crude emotional timeline. The notes are usually several days to a week apart:

The vaporware of a Jack Commer 7, which I do want to write but don’t want to feel rushed on.

The 2/20 visionary dream of space wars and empires.

The concept of new writing can be unsettling, because you’re not inside the magic consciousness of the novel yet and so doubt it can be done. Well, it may just be time to start pulling together some notes and just get started. See what happens.

I sense I’m closer than I think to new writing. Not quite ready to jump into a Chapter One just yet, of course, but it may be closer than I suspect. I think JC Seven may be the first one of some new kind of writing.

Now I can feel a major shift: I’m looking to “new novel” not out of a desire to “prove I can do it,” but because I need it to grow.

Okay: the decision has been made (and I leave that in passive voice because somehow that’s how it happened) to start JC 7 as soon as practicable. Even today’s writing session is starting it. There are enough ideas to get it rolling, and even if it’s a failure, so what? But now I’m seeing that the seventh book should conclude the series. The series has no overarching plot, but there can still be a conclusion, and I can be done with the series and characters on my own terms, not just “I wrote six of them and never got around to doing more.”

Jack Commer, Supreme Commander by Michael D. Smith

Jack’s wife Amav dominating the cover of Book Two, Jack Commer, Supreme Commander

So more Jack and Amav, and whatever characters I think need some amplification, but this time all expressed in a testbed of new writing and new energy. I want JC 7 to be fun storytelling; just see where it goes. There is also some research on neighboring stars to do, some framework to set in place. Rereading the first books in the series is also probably a good idea.

Some more thoughts and integration-yearning on a Jack Commer Seven this past week, along with the blog post on the Alpha Centaurian stars. JC 7 still needs some great focus, as right now it’s just sort of run-of-the-mill plot. Then again, many of my novel notes started this way. I remember thinking the original Collapse and Delusion notes weren’t that much of a story.

I’m having that “pre-novel malaise,” like the initial feeling of coming down with a cold. But somehow all this seeming negativity is pointing to something uncanny and new.

The main writing news is that I’m happily 12,000 words into interviewing twelve of the characters for Jack Commer Seven, having done six of the twelve since 4/1, and it feels like a mixture of notes and fiction, very therapeutic and with some good surprises. So about halfway done, expecting ca. 40-50 pages single-spaced.

Continue reading →

Balloon Ship Armageddon, Part 1 – Origins

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

T'ohj'puv copyright 2018 by Michael D. Smith

The T’ohj’puv Pyramid

I completed my seventeenth novel on October 6. This is the first draft of Balloon Ship Armageddon, the seventh and last Jack Commer, Supreme Commander novel, a statement I make with crossed fingers because who knows whether I might ever want to take Jack up again? I can’t help but notice that the force of rough draft logic left in a couple hints for future work …

I say this novel is “completed” because to me a finished rough draft is in some sense a completed novel. Something has been psychically started and finished. A truly “final completion” to manuscript status is of course X units of time away.

I haven’t reread the book yet and will probably let that task slide for a few more weeks. I’ve already had the alternately delightful and disturbing experience, common to a reasonably long draft of 88,000 words, of looking back to earlier chapters, composed a couple months ago, that I’d completely forgotten having written. So rereading a first draft is often like reading someone else’s book, and ideally should be conducted as noncritically as possible, giving the story a chance to breathe before the foundation construction crew arrives for Draft 2.

It’s hard to come up with any sort of synopsis, or the kind of marketing paragraph you’re expected to provide for a final manuscript. The initial draft seems to have sprung out of the unconscious, and so we have the following dreamlike babble:

In Book Six, The SolGrid Rebellion, Jack’s rebellious son Jonathan James wound up trapped inside a solid chromium pyramid after being obliterated by a Martian shattergun. In Balloon Ship Armageddon he’s successfully separated out from the pyramid to become a Wounded robot, though the two companions trapped inside the pyramid with him, Rick Ballard and T’ohj’puv, die horribly. The Wounded are a robotic race that infiltrate civilizations in order to steal all the energy from their stars to create quasar artworks billions of miles away. Okay. So Jonathan James heads to the Greater Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way 163,000 light years away, and a concept that’s fascinated me from childhood. Jonathan James thinks he’s now a Class J Wounded, but finally realizes he’s in fact a Class A, the highest level, programmed to initiate an Anti-Dark Energy Lens that will destroy the Orion Arm of the Milky Way, including the troublesome Sol which has resisted Wounded attempts at takeover. The Greater Magellanic world Jonathan James conquers, Ailyuae, has no electricity, even down to the subatomic level, and for 124,400 years the leaderless Wounded robots deposited there have fought endless senseless wars floating in balloon ships, since the oceanic surface of the planet is toxic.

Continue reading →

The SolGrid Rebellion in Paperback

Sortmind Blog - Michael D. Smith Posted on by

The SolGrid Rebellion at AmazonThe SolGrid Rebellion, Book Six of the Jack Commer, Supreme Commander series, is now out in paperback at Amazon. The novel expands a theme introduced in the previous books, the possibilities of telepathic understanding shared among an entire race, versus justifying the fascist control of that telepathic system as a defense against possible hostile aliens. The Sol System has adopted the buggy SolGrid telepathic network designed by former United System Space Force officer Patrick James, but Jack Commer’s charismatic but troubled son Jonathan James instigates a rebellion against what he considers brainwashing. His followers include his lover Suzette Borman, exobiologist Jackie Vespertine, SolGrid First Assistant Sanders Hirte, and warrior dog Trotter.

I’m about two-thirds through the first draft of a seventh Jack Commer novel, Balloon Ship Armageddon, and the plan is to end the series with seven. It’s time to move on from this genre … probably … although, who knows?

Copyright 2018 by Michael D. Smith

More on The SolGrid Rebellion