Back to the Caribbean

My friend and colleague, J. Lee Porter and I have finished the first draft of book two in the Bipats series: CRYPTO CITIZENS. It follows on the heels of CRYPTO SHRUGGED and looks at the ramifications of smart cities, surveillance capitalism, and of course, blockchain technology. It is a story of global intrigue and the fight for individual freedom. This story takes place in Mumbai, Ecuador, Singapore, Mexico, Venezuela, and Somalia, as well as the US and Europe and even out on the oceans.

We are working through the manuscript, and when it's done it will go to the editor and so on, but expect to get it out this year.

We are hoping to find someone who is interested in this struggle to find a meaningful balance between the implementation of technology and maintaining our individuality to write an introduction. To that end, we are reaching out to some key people. Unfortunately, key people can be difficult to reach, and it is an uphill battle to get them to read unpublished books. But it was ever so.

Meantime, I'm working on a trilogy of mystery stories that feature my favorite fictional character, Ron Anejo... the hero of my THE LEGEND OF RON ANEJO. He's still in the islands, based on the mythical island of Kayakoo at the lower end of the Lesser Antilles, and sailing his old Danish fishing boat, MeinGott. Even his dog Groucho gets involved when, in the first book, a land developer from Miami is killed. The working title for this one is Death by Jumbie Eyes. And if you don't know what jumbie eyes are, they are also called crab-eyed seeds and used in Obeah, the offshoot of voodoo practiced in the Caribbean.

It will be a fun story. I hope to have all three ready to go midyear.

Going Live with CRYPTO SHRUGGED

We've finally gotten the complete draft of CRYPTO SHRUGGED finished and formatted as an ebook. It includes a foreword by Adam Kokesh (@Adamkokesh) that sets the right tone. As a pragmatic Libertarian running for not President of the United States with the goal of peacefully, responsibly dissolving the federal government, (adam@thefreedomline.com) Adam's reading of the book provided some intriguing insights and ideas for us to explore in other books in the series.


The book was edited and now Domini Dragoone (www.dominidragoone.com) is doing a stunning layout for the print edition; once we have the final page count Elizabeth Mackey (www.elizabethmackeygraphics.com) will be modifying the ebook cover she did for us (below) into one appropriate for the paperback edition.

The book has been on preorder, but now, impatient souls that we are, we've moved the launch date up to this Friday, April 27, 2018. You can get it in various ebook formats from Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble (Nook), Kobo, Angus & Robertson, and Mondadori.
The print edition will be along shortly and we plan our first book signing at Isla Mujeres, Mexico, in mid-May where we will be celebrating Jeff and Gigi's wedding along with the launch of the book. It's also another opportunity to research a story, and we have another short story in the works that is based there.

Headed South to Stare at the Future

On the first of January, I'll be getting on a place for Cartagena, Colombia, by way of Phoenix and Fort Lauderdale. After a few days there I'll be going to Medellin for a couple of weeks before retracing my steps. This trip has three objectives. The first one is that I'll meet up with J. Lee Porter for our first face-to-face meeting. He and I are working on an exciting project--a series of novels about the way Cryptocurrency is changing the world, focusing on the ways people, governments, and institutions (regulators, banks, law enforcement agencies...) respond to its benefits and threats. It's also about how people who are unwilling to relinquish their freedoms fight back.

It's been going along well, but it's going to be great to sit down and talk over some facets. The world is changing faster than we could imagine and much of what we thought would come to pass soon is happening already.

We've got a great team helping us with the books... a pro cover designer (Elizabeth Mackey) and interior designer (Domini Dragoone) will make the books even better. Elizabeth has already done the ebook cover for the first book: CRYPTO SHRUGGED which will be ready for preorder in Q1 of next year (toward the end, don't get too impatient). When we get closer, I'll post the cover so you can get as excited as we are.

We will also be researching Colombia as the locale for one of the upcoming books. The feel of a place, the way it strikes you, is more important than facts about it. What it smells and sounds like stay with you. We want to capture some of that.

The third reason for looking forward to this trip is simply that I've never been to Colombia. I've been in Venezuela and Ecuador and now I'm looking forward to Colombia.

I'll post some photos from the trip and keep you advised of our progress. As I said, this is an exciting project.