I remember reading Jean M. Auel’s Earth’s Children series when I was in college and marveling at how primitive people spent their winter during the Ice Age. They had to prepare for the long, cold winter where they would be trapped inside for months and had to have enough provisions to last until Spring.
I have a much better idea of what that must have been like now. With Covid cases exploding across the country, hunkering down for winter seems like a really good plan. Although if people keep hoarding toilet paper, we’ll get an even better idea of what primitive man dealt with…
Here in Oregon, we’re under increased restrictions already, on a county-by-county basis. Lincoln County, where WMG is headquartered, is considered a high-risk county because of our recent case increases. Among other restrictions is a work-from-home recommendation, so home is where I’m writing this. Thankfully, we have that capability.
I’ve also stocked up on baking supplies to get us through the long, dark winter. And soup. I’ll be making lots of soup.
Spring will come. We just need to survive the difficult winter.
Thank goodness books have been invented since the Ice Age.
If you’re looking for something new in that department, I have two new releases to tell you about.
First is the latest volume in our Year of the Cat series edited by Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith, A Cat of Heroic Heart.
Here’s the synopsis:
Everyone knows dogs save people. Cats do too, in a different way.
Although cats feign an aloof detachment, they possess great heart. A cat rescue comes on its own terms and in its own time, and always with dignified heroism.
From a fantastic Midnight Louie story by Carole Nelson Douglas, where Louie meets Sherlock Holmes, to a familiar rescuing other familiars from a natural disaster, this volume showcases a broad spectrum of heroic cats.
Includes:
“A Baker Street Irregular” by Carole Nelson Douglas
“Cat in Love” by Dean Wesley Smith
“Nine Lives” by E. Nesbit
“Gilroy and the Kitten” by Jamie Ferguson
“Disaster Relief” by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
“Christmas, Interrupted” by Lisa Silverthorne
“The Coffee Curse” by Stefon Mears
“Of Cats & Lost Socks” by Liz Pierce
To curl up with this fantastic volume of cat fiction, click here.
And if you’d rather (or also) like to transport yourself to a different time (perfectly understandable), there’s Time Travelers, our latest volume of Fiction River Presents, which is edited by Gwyneth Gibby..
Here’s the synopsis:
The desire to travel through time occupies many daydreams. It also drives many plot lines. After all, a good story transports the reader to a different time and place, no matter the genre.
This volume of Fiction River Presents gathers some of those incredible time travel tales together into one volume. In these stories, characters want to fix something in the past, solve mysteries, escape to an unknown future, or maybe just get a glimpse of it.
So, get ready for a trip on the Spacetime Express. Backward, forward, and sideways, these adventures through time offer a passport into the unknown and beyond.
Includes:
“Tower One” by Thomas K. Carpenter
“September at Wall & Broad” by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
“The Elevator in the Cornfield” by Scott William Carter
“Sacred Poet from the Future” by Kelly Cairo
“The Wages of the Moment” by Dean Wesley Smith
“Three Strikes” by Chuck Heintzelman
“Christmas, Interrupted” by Lisa Silverthorne
“Love in the Time of Dust and Venom” by Sharon Joss
This volume even includes a very timely (and wonderful) Christmas story. Check it out here.
So, stock up, stay in, and stay safe.
Allyson Longueira is publisher of WMG Publishing. She is an award-winning writer, editor and designer, working mother, and brain tumor survivor.