Everyday Fiction picks up "The Wheel of Curses"

A flash fiction I wrote earlier in Dec, titled "The Wheel of Curses" has been picked up by EveryDay Fiction to run at a future date.

This is cool, because this flash is in the world of "Infinite Realities" but from the perspective of Sisko's best friend Josh as he is learning magic and attempts to use it to manipulate a game of chance.

This will be my second story to run in this magazine. A real treat.

The Powerful Conclusion of "Infinite Realites" in Print!

The last story in my series, Infinite Realities is now in print at The Sword Review! This powerful story provides the perfect climax to the series. You'll not want to miss it.

Ultimate Realities

Tease: Sisko takes the ultimate journey to discover what he really loves most. Can he bear the truth?

And don't forget, the four stories that have come out at The Sword Review are all contained in my book Infinite Realities. But wait! There's more. The book also contains an additional chapter/story that doesn't appear in the on-line serial, Undesired Realities, as well as an article at the end about why I write fantasy and sci-fi.

If you haven't checked out the book, visit the Double-Edged Publishing Store, or Amazon.com

Or your local bookstore can also order it for you.

Thanks to all of you for your support. Enjoy!

A Poem of Stellar Proportions!

My poem, "Soul Light" is now appearing in print at Dragons, Knights, and Angels. This is a poem I submitted for their poetry contest this past fall. It didn't win, but they still wanted it, and I was more than happy to have them publish it.

This poem is allegorical, and to full catch the allegory, it can be helpful to know something about supernova and the creation of news stars. You can read a lot about supernova at the Wikipedia article. Here is an excerpt from that article which is key to understanding the poem, if you are not aware of it.

Supernovae tend to enrich the surrounding interstellar medium with metals, which for astronomers means all of the elements other than hydrogen and helium and is a different definition than that used in chemistry.

These injected elements ultimately enrich the molecular clouds that are the sites of star formation. Thus, each stellar generation has a slightly different composition, going from an almost pure mixture of hydrogen and helium to a more metal-rich composition. Supernovae are the dominant mechanism for distributing these heavier elements, which are formed in a star during its period of nuclear fusion, throughout space. The different abundances of elements in the material that forms a star have important influences on the star's life, and may decisively influence the possibility of having planets orbiting it.

The kinetic energy of an expanding supernova remnant can trigger star formation due to compression of nearby, dense molecular clouds in space. The increase in turbulent pressure can also prevent star formation if the cloud is unable to lose the excess energy.

That's all the clues I'll give you. Thanks for reading and enjoy!

"Unseen Realities" Debuts at "The Sword Review"

The third installment of the serial Infinite Realities (fourth chapter in the book) is now in print at The Sword Review. In the old town of Dragon's Inn, not all is as it seems. Superstition hides a real danger that challenges Sisko's faith.

Check out Unseen Realities.

And if you like the story, be sure to get your order in for a copy of the book, Infinite Realities. And why not buy a copy for those on your Christmas list too?

Thanks!

"Infinite Realities" Becomes a Reality in Print!

And now for some really big news!

My novella length book, Infinite Realities is finally out!

Currently, you can buy it from Amazon.com.

You should also be able to purchase it from Double-Edged Publishing's bookstore as well. And, I'll have some copies to sell too, if you would like an author's signed copy. I'll provide a link for that when I get it set up.

I think this would make a great Christmas gift for any teens on your list, especially if they enjoy a good fantasy story. And naturally, if you get a copy and enjoyed it, a good review on Amazon will be very appreciated.

Thanks so much for all who have supported me, and I expect this to be only the first. I have a novel length sequel to this book written in rough draft which turned out excellent. I hate it that it will be many more months before many will get to read it. But you can be assured it will come out, somewhere.

Now, go buy a copy for Christmas. You and your loved ones deserve a good, uplifting story.

"Unknown Realities" continues the saga!

Finally, my second chapter of Infinite Realities is up at The Sword Review.

This is the first new story picking up where Steamy Realities leaves off, and follows Sisko on his journey as a miracle worker.

Setting out on his travels to fulfill his calling, Sisko discovers raw hate a powerful enemy while dealing with self-doubt.

Unknown Realities

I should warn you, The Sword Review is one of the sites that have been involved with the massive server outage that you may have heard or read about in the news. Something like 180,000 sites have been out for various lengths of times since Saturday. The site has come up twice now only to go back down, but as of this writing it us up today. Hopefully it will stay that way. But in case you go to it and you get a blank page or it doesn't come up, try again later.

Thanks for reading!

Copple's Creations

Novel Writing in Open Office Writer

There are several software packages designed for writers. Some of them free. Among some of the features they offer is the ability to move chapters and scenes around, have their headings automatically renumbered when you do, outlining help, etc. But what most of these don't have is a full featured word processor. Now, some people are happy not having all that MS Word has to offer. They prefer next to plain text. Cool. But for those who want and are used to that power, using these bare-bones word processors will make you feel insecure, afraid you may write for a while to discover that this can't do something you can't live without, and you'll end up messing with a bunch of work-arounds or have to do some tedious cut and paste exercise to put it into a full word processor you can use.

Never fear, we have a solution! While this won't give you every advantage some of the bigger and more expensive novel writing packages can deliver, it does give you the flexibility to automatically number your chapters and scenes, and move them around as well, and within a full-featured word processor.

Most have probably heard of Open Office, a suite of software applications, which among others, has a word processor called "Writer." This word processor rivals Word as far as usability, functionality, and processing power. There are several who would say it does a few things better, but if you looked at reviews, there are also areas where Word does better. However, for basic writing functions, the average Word user will notice little difference. But, with the function of Open Office's Navigaor, you can set it up to do what many other novel writing packages can do. And the best thing, being open source, it is free to download and use.

I've written an article on how to set this up, called: Using Open Office Writer for Novel Writing

For those preparing for "National Novel Writing Month" as I am, they may find this useful. Here's hoping some benefit. Thanks.

"Public Identities" Now in Print!

My story, Public Identities is now up at A Thousand Faces Magazine.

What happens when a superhero ends up in the hospital? Tornado Man finds out.

This isn't your usual superhero story. Then again, this isn't your standard superhero magazine either. So it made a good fit. Drop by, take a read, and enjoy.

"The Cold Truth" and "Mirror, Mirror on the Screen" are in print!

My flash fiction sci-fi space opera story, "The Cold Truth" is now available at Everyday Fiction. Be sure to head over and check it out.

Neil and his buddy will be the first to dive under Neptune's clouds. What will they find within the Ice Giant?

Also, coming out October 1, in Resident Aliens is my micro flash fiction, "Mirror, Mirror on the Screen" that won an honorable mention in their contest. Be sure to read that as well, you will enjoy the irony, and there are sure to be several good micro flashes there. Obviously, since a few beat mine, they have to be pretty good. Eh?

Thanks for reading!

Copple's Creations

Micro-fiction places in contest!

I submitted a micro-fiction (a story under 100 words) to Residential Aliens, a new speculative fiction magazine that recently started up, for a contest they were holding. According to my sources, I received an honorable mention. The issue is to come out October 1st. Here's the promo:

RESIDENTIAL ALIENS features award-winning R. L. Copple's story



The zine Residential Aliens is set to publish R. L. Copple's micro-fiction piece, Mirror, Mirror on the Screen, in their October 1st Issue. R. L. Copple was a finalist in RA's recent 100 word or less flash fiction contest.



Residential Aliens, edited by Lyn Perry, is an online magazine devoted to quality speculative fiction with a spiritual foundation. Watch for R. L. Copple's story at http://residentialaliens.blogspot.com/




R. L. Copple is the author of several poems and stories published by Dragon's, Knights, and Angels, The Sword Review, Haruah, Ray Gun Revival, EveryDay Fiction, and A Thousand Faces including Monkey Madness which places second in the Ray Gun Revival flash fiction contest. You can read more about R. L. Copple at http://www.rlcopple.com.

 Copple's Creations

"Steamy Realities" kicks off new series!

"Steamy Realities" was originally published at The Sword Review in Dec. 2006, last year. Since then, I've developed a whole four chapter series based on this story which, if you've read this blog before, have all been accepted to run at The Sword Review.

The reprint of this story kicks off the new series, which will run through December, and I will soon have a book of novella length selling on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and can be ordered at your local bookstore titled Infinite Realities.

If you missed reading it the first time, or want to enjoy it again, here's your excuse. More news to come soon.

Copple's Creations Blog

Contest poem doesn't place, but will be published.

I submitted a poem to Dragon, Knights, and Angels' annual poetry contest again this year. Readers may recall last year one of my poems won an honorable mention, which is more than I could expect as there are several great poets that submit there. Again, they had a lot of entries, around fourty I'm told. But this time, I didn't place in the contest.

However, they did send me a contract to publish the poem anyway. So, while not an "award winning" poem in this case, it will see the light of day.

It is a little more than interesting that all of my speculative poetry has been published by DKA. For some reason, the pieces I've sent them work, while one's I've submitted elsewhere don't. But this makes the fourth poem of mine they will publish. Hum, maybe I just need to pretend to write a poem for DKA, but then submit it elsewhere. Who knows, just might work.

My old comics

I had these on my previous blog, and am just now getting back to putting them up again.

My brother and I, back as pre-teens, started writing comics, making stories, and having fun. You can say that this was my first story creation medium. First, we started with using our stuffed toys to create comics, but later we developed a whole list of human superheros and villians. I even had a comic that was a take-off of Speed Racer that was my favorite.

One time, my brother and I decided to send off our characters to Marvel, in the vain hope that they would think, "Oh, these are great. Let's use them and send these kids a lot of money for 'em!" Yea, right. What can I say, we were young, naive teens. But I do wonder, because one of my characters was "Magnet Man." He looked a lot like Iron Man but use Earth's gravity fields to fly and take out the bad guys. I'll have to research this, but I wondered when I saw "Magnito" on the X-Men, whether or not my character spawned that idea or not. Hum...

Anyway, most of those old comics I no longer have. Which is a shame because it would be real interesting to re-read some of them now in retrospect. But, I do have three, fortunately. They are all from our stuffed toy collection, and they all feature my favorite stuffed toy, a teddy bear named "Charlie." These comics are in PDF format, and you can download them freely. They've never been published anywhere except at this blog and website. Hope you enjoy them.

This first comic is from my earliest series, that I called "Detective Charlie." Usually the story went that he received his orders from the boss, the device always blows up, he goes after the bad guys but mostly he seems to "win" by sheer luck, and no matter what situation he is in, he just happens to be carrying with him what he needs! It was intentionally a spoofy series on James Bond type things. I never got around to coloring this one, so all black and white. This one is under 500KB in size.

Detective Charlie: Death Trap

The second one is one of my favorite series, which I called "Neptune 2." "Hum," you say. "That sounds familiar, this wouldn't be a take off of Lost in Space, now would it?" Well, yea, you could call it that. There is a similar shape to the ships and they usually crash land. Only thing missing is the robot. But you can say these are my first attempts at space opera, though I had no idea what that was then, I just liked space stories. This is mostly colored, and so the file is on the bigger side, just over 6.5 Megs.

Neptune 2: It's a Long Ways Down

The last one is one of my superhero comics. Sort of a League of superheros type story. Detective Charlie heads up this organization, with Sound Rabbit, Silver Mouse and Bear. This one was partially colored so the file is a little big, but not as big as the last one, at 2.6 megs.

The Superhero Outfit: The Final Test

Hope you enjoy them. I just might get back into writing more someday. Once I get the rust out of my drawing skills.

Copple's Creations

"Monkey Madness" wins second place in flash fiction contest!

Yep, that's right. Second place! Do I hear a wOOt! Cool. The story is in Ray Gun Revival's recently posted issue, #29. Open that pdf up and click on the next to the last contest entry to place and you'll find it.

This was a challenge in that the story had to be 500 words or less. The shortest story I've written yet. Well, honestly I've recently submitted to a micro-flash fiction contest (I'll let you know how that turns out) that is under 100 words, but this is the shortest published to date. So it is a quick read. And the other interesting winners are there too, along with some good stories and the start of what looks to be a good serial. So check it out.

We'll have several notices coming out this month. I know of at least three other stories coming out this month, and my book should be available by the end of this month. So, check back!

Copple's Creations

"Where's My Soul?" Find out here!

That's actually the name of a poem I wrote, and was picked up by TeenAge Magazine. Today it has hit the web-print pages. Here is the link to it:

Where's My Soul?

Here's hoping you find it. Enjoy!

Copple's Creations

Flash Fiction "The Cold Truth" accepted

My flash fiction story, "The Cold Truth" has been accepted and scheduled to go to print at a new email-based magazine called, Everyday Fiction. If you click that link and scroll down a bit. you'll see my story is scheduled to go out on Sept. 29th.

And I'm sure they would be pleased if you subscribed to their service (it's free). They send a 1000 word or less fiction story in your email each day. Enjoy!

Copple Creation's Blog

"Marvelous Man" now in print!

I wrote this mainstream fiction story a while back. The editors at Haruah liked it (this is before I became managing editor and I didn't vote) and decided to run it. So, here it is in all its glory!

How does thirteen-year-old Jared face the fears of growing up in the midst of a divorce and new dad?

Marvelous Man

Thanks for checking!

Blog has moved

Yes, I've moved the blog. I put a redirect on my old site, so if you came here by typing http://www.copple.us/blog/ then you will want to update any bookmarks to http://blog.rlcopple.com

Yep, new site and new hosting company. Moved the blog over successfully and now have an official author web site at http://www.rlcopple.com. Be sure to update and keep checking in. Best to subscribe to the RSS feed if at all possible.

Thanks.

I have a book to sell!

I have some exciting news to announce. My first ever book to be sold on Amazon.com and other places with an ISBN and everything!

Double-Edged Publishing, Inc. has decided to print my four part series set to run in The Sword Review from September through December. The book will be titled Infinite Realities and will be almost 16,000 words long. Cover art is being worked on. Here is the blurb for the book:

Sisko seeks his life's purpose in the steam house and believes he has found it. But is he really ready for the life of a miracle-worker? Follow Sisko through rage, fire, failure, and love as he attempts to be a blessing to others instead of a curse on himself.

Expected release date will be mid-September to beginning of October. I will naturally update you when it goes on sale so you can stock up on Christmas gifts.

Fireworks! Happy 4th!

I took shots of our town's fireworks this evening, and want to share them with our wonderful readers. Consider this a special 4th of July treat from Haruah!

These shots were taken with my Canon digital camera, with a slow shutter speed, hand held. Thus, the wiggly lines. Yet, I think the wiggly lines actually add to the shots, making them perhaps more interesting than your standard firework shot.

For best results, click the link below, switch to the full screen view in the browser (F11 works for both IE and FireFox) and then click on the "Start slideshow" link toward the bottom. Or, feel free to hit the next button and go through them at your own pace. There are 48 pics.

Marble Falls, TX Fireworks

Enjoy and hope you all had a great 4th!

Two points of interest!

First, some of you might like to know that I have a photo on the cover of a book selling at Amazon!

It is called: Words of Comfort from God and Others

Though it doesn't mention me on the site, the cover photo is actually (for those who know where this is) a shot of Cow Creek here in central Texas. Click on the title above to go to Amazon and see it.

The other bit of news is that I have ended up with the job of managing editor at Haruah: Breath of Heaven

Rachel Marks, the previous managing editor, took off for another future magazine. She will be sorely missed, but we have some new editors who have come on board recently to help take up the slack.

Also, I'll mess up my title and mention one other point of interest. At the magazine TeenAge a column I wrote (actually back in the early 1980s) is running. To be honest, it is a silly piece, but hopefully a bit fun too.

Thanks!

Copple's Creations

“Waking Nightmares” has gone to print

Haruah: Breath of Heaven: Jun. 21 Update

Though written well before the events, the editors felt this piece captured the emotion of the Virgina Tech shooting. A nightmare in the real sense of the word.

"Waking Nightmares" by R. L. Copple

What lurks in the deep recesses of the mind when the eyes close and dreams erupt? Sometimes the waking world has its own nightmares we wish were only a dream.

"Waking Nightmares"

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Visit Haruah: Breath of Heaven Now!

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“Foundational Realities” is complete!

Today I received an acceptance on my rewrite of the 2nd chapter of this series: "Unknown Realities." That means the whole series is slated to go to print at The Sword Review sometime in 2008, all four chapters.

I'm really excited by this acceptance as I feel really good about the stories and have a sense that they will be well received. I've already has some very positive comments by those who have critiqued the stories. And I expect one way or another, these will get put into a chap book around the time they come out in the magazine by either the magazine publishers, or I may do it myself after they run. I'm sure I'll have news related to that as the time draws near.

Another sub bites the…acceptance pile!

I found out today that a quaint little flash fiction I wrote called "Public Identities" was picked up by a relatively new magazine, called A Thousand Faces.

This is a "super human" magazine, and I'm glad to have a story there as I like superhero type stories. As a matter of fact, looking back at my stories I didn't realize how many of them end up with superhero types in them. I think that comes from my comic writing days as a teen, and reading many of them. Even Sikso in Steamy Realities is superhero-like in his abilities, though put on him by God. (The series which goes with that will come out in 2008.)

This story is tentatively scheduled to appear in their fall issue. I'll of course give you a heads up when that happens.

“Voices” now in print!

My flash fiction, "Voices" which was accepted by the new horror e-zine and is now their first officialy non-public domain fiction in print! A nice honor to start off their new e-zine. I wish them much success. Here are the links:

Fear and Trembling Magazine

"Voices" at Fear and Trembling Magazine

New acceptances flood in!

Yes, after a lull in acceptances and print announcements, I now have some more to announce.

First up, is a poem I wrote back in the summer of last year. After waiting its turn for several months in the Haruah submission bin, interest in it picked up and revisions were made, and now they have accepted it for publication.

It is titled, "Waking Nightmares"

Along with that one, a favorite story of mine, my only "mainstream/literary" story, has been accepted at Haruah as well. This is one that I created for a "duel" at Notebored last fall, titled "Marvelous Man." Somehow, I knew this would end up there.

My last acceptance to announce is for a new Horror e-zine that is just starting up called "Fear and Trembling." You can check it out at the following link:

Fear and Trembling Magazine

My story is the first original story to be accepted there, as their first official month in print will be June, 2007. The story is titled "Voices."

I should add, I'm not much of a horror guy. Yet, I've written this one, and a poem or two that can be labeled in that category (like the poem I mentioned above). But I will add, when you click on the link above, that I'm the one responsible for adding the fade in of the magazine contents over the cover illo. It took a little work to get all the browsers to behave themselves (and yours might be the one that doesn't work with it). If you have an updated current browser, like Internet Explorer, Firefox, Netscape, Opera, or Safari, it should work.

And, in a few days, I should find out how my submission to the Dragons, Knights and Angels contest faired. I'm not expecting anything, but you never know.

About the banner photo…

Just thought people might be interested to know that the photo in the banner is actually one of my own. I took that photo one Saturday evening returning home from church. There is a rest area at the top of the hill overlooking Marble Falls, TX (where I live) along with a lake which you can't see in this picture, hills in the background, and very lovely golden with dark clouds sunset going on. One of my favorite, though I have lots.

But thought folks might want to know this isn't some stock photo I pulled off the Internet or came with the theme. All mine! And has appeared in a different crop at http://www.haruah.com as a story illustration.

I have a photo page at http://www.copple.us, but I hope to have a more organized one in the future as part of this blog. But that will take a little work.

The Blog is Back!

Yes, we have been down for a while. Our hosting company's data server ended up going out of business, from all appearences, and without warning shut down the servers. So he had to set up a new account with a new data center, and reset their client's accounts on the new server. Unfortunately, that took over a week. But, we finally came back up and I've finally got around to installing the blog again.

Just one problem. So far I'm not able to create sub-domains, so instead of blog.copple.us, the blog is now located at www.copple.us/blog/

That means updating some links and RSS feeds. Sorry for that inconvenience. But, I've moved to a different blog software, and will be adding features as I go. And, I've still a few bugs to work out on a web site or two's coding, that doesn't work here but did on the older servers.

Check back here for updates again, and reset your RSS feeds if you used that. We're back.