Good morning, friends and fans!
Welcome to another “Peek Into My Week”, a behind the scenes look into the (I hope) noteworthy events in my past week – November 15, 2021!
As you can probably tell by now, writers are diverse people with diverse interests, whose days are often filled with diverse activities. While I am a writer, writing isn’t always the only thing I do! That said, here are some things that happened this past week, starting at the top, with writing-related news:
Writing & Publishing News:
You may recall that I’ve been eagerly awaiting the impending release of several new audiobooks which have already been submitted to ACX for approval, including “Dead Man’s Hammer“, “Lifetime” and “Space Sucks!“.
The audiobook version is narrated by Jennifer Pratt and is 2 hours 53 minutes long, and available on Audible and Amazon. To celebrate this, I posted ““Space Sucks!” – Now Available As An Audiobook!“
Likewise, on Saturday morning I awoke to the news that “Dead Man’s Hammer” had also been released during the night! Narrated by Darla Middlebrook, the audiobook is 6 hours 2 minutes long, and also available on Audible and Amazon! That just leaves Lifetime in the present queue at ACX, and I’m sure it will be out very soon – but there are still more on the way!
In addition to this wonderful news, Brandon Mullins of Moon Books Publishing, the company responsible for creating these awesome audiobook versions of my stories, sent me the finished covers for the next three titles of the Quantum series – which are in varying stages of recording and production! You can see them below – awesome aren’t they?
Moving on to the editing side of things, I finished the 100k word editing project I’ve been working on for Moon Books Publishing on Tuesday. “Not All Fairy Tales Have Happy Endings” by Ken Williams is an insider’s story, an autobiographical documentary about the rise and fall of Sierra On-line, one of computing’s pioneers who, among others, produced such immortal games such as the “Leisure-suit Larry”, “King’s Quest” and “Half-Life” series of games! Ken & Roberta Williams were the founders of Sierra.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this personal account – in fact, I was one of those 90’s gamers (I started everything late!) who wondered what the hell had happened to Sierra and where they went! Half-life was a firm favorite of mine and several groups of my friends. We used to meet up for LAN game sessions on weekends and Half-life was our standard death-match choice that superseded the venerable Doom 1 and 2. As time went by, we grew older and more solitary, our interests shifted, and we stopped gathering to play death-matches… but when old friends strike up conversations, we reminisce about those good old times, and our favorite games. In fact, I may still scratch around for a copy of Half-life one day again, and invite a few friends to join me in battle!
The story drew me in and made me feel involved. Sierra’s successes and triumphs felt like my own, and Sierra’s fall felt like a pain of my own as well. I truly wish Ken and Roberta and their family all the best for their futures, and feel honored to have been able to share in their legacy in my own small way.
Further afield, a novelette I wrote called “Opsaal” has been snatched up by Moon Books and appeared on Amazon and various other places in paperback format on Saturday night! The eBook version will probably appear early this week, and I’m happy to say an audiobook is also in the future!
Project D.O.L.L.Y. Again:
On Wednesday I finally got round to making the bracket I wanted to support the front end of Dolly’s gearbox. As you can see, it’s a very tight, narrow space, and the bracket has to fit round the contours of the gearbox and between the chassis fork – while avoiding the clutch cable and battery earth cable very precisely! I first used a length of slim gauge wire to get the shape just right, and used that as a template for the actual bracket. I used an old TV aerial bracket for the job – it’s made of galvanized and folded steel! A coat of rust converter for protection and high heat black paint helped seal it for protection against the elements. The purpose of the two-part bracket (which closes snugly around the circumference of the long end of the transmission case) is to secure it in place to prevent any movement, to augment the stock gearbox mounting at the very front of the gearbox.
On Friday I built a strap from a strip of steel to secure the rear end of the gearbox to the chassis fork. The purpose of that bracket/strap is to preserve the two rear gearbox mountings. On Saturday I finished the last two items I needed to do on the motor while I’m still waiting for the exhaust J pipes and pushrod tubes. Once those arrive, the motor is basically ready to go back in! What I did was to make a pair of baffle plates to close gaps in the lower air duct plates.
After that, I made a modification to the fan shroud to allow it to be installed or removed without having to first remove the bonnet or its mounting brackets! If you’ll recall, I vented about this issue in an article I posted about Beetles a few weeks ago: “Things That Really Burn Me Up About VW Beetles!“.
I treated myself to a Sunday in pajamas! With that, I’m all out of news for this week! I wish you all a wonderful, restful day – and until next time, keep reading! 
Cheers!
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All material copyright © Christina Engela, 2021.