Interview at Apex Book Company

The marvelous M.G. Ellington, Marketing Director and Blog Editor of Apex Book Company, interviewed me today at the Apex Book Company blog.  This is the first ever interview about The Elephant and Macaw Banner, and contains a lot of information about future directions for the series.

In her introduction, M.G. writes: “Christopher Kastensmidt’s ‘The Fortuitous Meeting of Gerard van Oost and Oludara’ was my main reason for subscribing to Realms of Fantasy this year… Christopher gives his readers the best of both worlds. The story is a swift moving adventure, carefully constructed for a seamless flow of information that paints in the landscape and the period without bogging the reader down.”

All I can say is, “Wow, thanks!”  Read the full interview here.

Locus Magazine reviews “Fortuitous Meeting”

Rich Horton reviews “The Fortuitous Meeting of Gerard van Oost and Oludara” in the April 2010 issue of Locus Magazine.  Here’s what he has to say:

“I also enjoyed Christopher Kastensmidt’s “The Fortuitous Meeting of Gerard Van Oost and Oludara”, set in Brazil, in which Van Oost frees Oludara from slavery.  This is a sort of origin story, and so we get to see each hero perform one heroic (and clever) feat, setting up further adventures for the pair.”

Thanks for the wonderful reivew, Mr. Horton!  More of those adventures are coming soon.

And thanks to Douglas Cohen for the head’s up!

Yoruba month at the EAMB website

April will be Yoruba month here at the Elephant and Macaw Banner website.

For those keeping track, most of the posts so far in the “World” section have been about elements from the first act of “The Fortuitous Meeting of Gerard van Oost and Oludara”, the part in which Gerard and Oludara have their fateful encounter in Salvador.  Now I’ll be moving on to the second part of the story, Oludara’s tale set in the ancient, Yoruba-speaking kingdom of Ketu, in Western Africa.

I haven’t studied Africa in anywhere near the depth I’ve studied Colonial Brazil, but I have studied it enough to offer some interesting tidbits.  So during April, all new World posts will all deal with Yoruban Africa.  I have four posts planned, starting with one this week about the ancient kingdom of Ketu.

In May, I’ll start posting about elements from the third and final part of the story.

As always, I hope you enjoy the posts!

A Big Thank You

The Elephant and Macaw Banner website is now two months old, and I’d like to give a heartfelt thanks to everyone who has taken the time to visit!

To date, we’ve receved over 500 unique visitors and 2,500 page views.  And that doesn’t count people who receive the content directly from Facebook, Livejournal, and the RSS feed.

It’s a great start!

Many thanks to the people who have helped promote the website, including Cory Doctorow, M.G. Ellington, Catherine Schaff-Stump, Aliette de Bodard, Jeremy Tolbert, Pam Wallace, and of course Realms of Fantasy magazine.  Thanks for sending readers our way!

And a final, extra special thank you for everyone who has told me, privately or publicly, that they enjoyed the story.  I have been overwhelmed by the response, it has gone far beyond the feedback I’ve received for all my other work put together!  That is exactly why writers publish, to try and make that connection, and it has truly been a special experience for me.  For all the readers who enjoyed the first story, I hope I can repeat the experience again with many more tales to come!

In the meantime, plenty more content is coming in the weeks and months to come.  Hope you enjoy!