Story bundle

One afternoon, 15 years ago, I walked into a bar in Los Angeles and pulled up a stool next to Billy Dee Williams. I apologized for being late. I’d driven up from San Diego where I was visiting with a cousin. Even though I had started out early, traffic was nearly deadlocked at times and the 125-mile drive took more than three hours.

Billy and I talked about our novel PSI/NET and the plans for a sequel. The black protagonist was a retired remote viewer, or psychic spy, who re-activates and ultimately saves the nation’s capital from a backpack nuclear bomb. We also talked about the possibility of a movie or TV series, starring Billy, of course, as the protagonist, Trent Calloway.

Billy did most of the publicity for PSI/NET, but I  joined him in Atlanta where we made joint appearances at a science fiction writers conference and radio shows. I clearly recall one stop on the tour. We arrived at a black-owned radio station in downtown Atlanta in a limo that the publisher had provided. Billy had his window open and people on the street recognized him. He obviously enjoyed the recognition.

We entered the radio station, and I couldn’t help noticing that everyone working there was black, and so were the guests—except me. As the show began, I sat between Billy Dee and four-time world heavyweight champion Evander Hollyfield. I remember the radio personality asking Billy to repeat some of his famous lines from Lady Sings the Blues…and then, oddly enough, he would turn to me and say, “Now, Rob, you say the lines.” Kind of funny. I also remember asking Hollyfield what he ate for breakfast while he was in training. His answer: two baked chicken breasts. Yeah, breakfast…after running several miles. I didn’t ask him about his ear, but I couldn’t help taking a peek to see if I could see a scar.

I was thinking about all this stuff today because that novel, PSI/NET came out in a special e-book promotion along with five other science fiction novels. It’s called a ‘story bundle’ and for the next 20 days readers get all six books, but pay only what they want, a minimum of $3 for the bundle. Readers who pay $15 or more get even more novels from a secondary list. Trish paid $16 and got 13 novels. Sure, most of these novels, like PSI/NET, have been previously published, but the price is right and the stories are great.

So if you’re a science fiction/fantasy fan, take a look here. The novels are categorized as a sub-genre, cyber punk, which is defined as stories in a near future-dystopian setting, usually featuring high tech tools. I’m not sure that PSI/NET exactly fits that mold, but I’m glad to have it in the bundle.

I was thinking there’s no synchronicity in this post, but then I realized there actually was one. I wanted to get this post up as quickly as possible, Thursday being the earliest I could do so. That’s when I realized that I was writing about a story of a terrorist attack on the nation’s capital in a post being published  on 9/11.