ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Weston Ochse is a former intelligence officer and special operations soldier who has engaged enemy combatants, terrorists, narco smugglers, and human traffickers. His personal war stories include performing humanitarian operations over Bangladesh, being deployed to Afghanistan, and a near miss being cannibalized in Papua New Guinea. His fiction and non-fiction has been praised by USA Today, The Atlantic, The New York Post, The Financial Times of London, and Publishers Weekly. The American Library Association labeled him one of the Major Horror Authors of the 21st Century. His work has also won the Bram Stoker Award, been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, and won multiple New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards. A writer of more than 26 books in multiple genres, his military supernatural series SEAL Team 666 has been optioned to be a movie starring Dwayne Johnson. His military sci fi series, which starts with Grunt Life, has been praised for its PTSD-positive depiction of soldiers at peace and at war. Weston likes to be called a chaotic good paladin and challenges anyone to disagree. After all, no one can really stand a goody two-shoes lawful good character. They can be so annoying. It's so much more fun to be chaotic, even when you're striving to save the world. You can argue with him about this and other things online at Living Dangerously or on Facebook at Badasswriter. All content of this blog is copywrited by Weston Ochse.
Showing posts with label Burning Sky. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Burning Sky. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 26, 2018

Templeton Gate Reviews Burning Sky

I was chuffed as they say in the UK about this review. I love these guys and constantly want to impress them because if I can do that, it means I've done something. Looks like I did. 5 stars. Wow.

Here's an excerpt:

This is highly recommended. I'm willing to follow wherever Ochse leads, and I need to track down some of his earlier work. Yesterday I rated this 5 stars at Amazon and Goodreads, and also mentioned that the author might be surprised about other books I thought of while reading. One of them was still very much fresh in my mind, since I had read Joe Haldeman's Hugo and Nebula winner Forever Peace for the first time last week. What I'm referencing is only the part about the Jupiter Project and the speculation as to what might happen if it was completed. Another book I thought of is Olaf Stapledon's Star Maker, still one of the best books I've ever read. It is all about the vastness of the cosmos, the wide range of species that dwell on various planets of the far-flung galaxies, and the possible discovery of the ultimate creator of it all. I've typed several other sentences, edited them, then decided to delete them as too spoilery. I'll leave it as an exercise for other readers to figure out why those books came to mind. Is there an ultimate beginning point to the universe, or an ultimate end point, or is it a perpetual motion machine, destined to repeat forever? Is everything Boy Scout experiences part of the fugue? Will he ever escape it? I don't know yet, but I'm anxious to find out. If you're not into such musings, if you only want military action (there is plenty of that here) this might not be the book for you. If you're game for things beyond the material world, even as a mere thought experiment, there is much here to satisfy. It has prompted me to do more research into Zoroastrianism and other spiritual disciplines, which I hope to do before the announced sequel, Dead Sky, is released.

You can read the entire very lengthy review here.





Radioactive Reviews Burning Sky

I was very psyched to see that Radioactive Book Reviews decided to review Burning Sky. They are known to be a no shit hard-assed review site that can be trusted. 

Here's an excerpt.

Overall this book was good, but not my new favourite. I really think there’s a huge difference between what the book looks like on the outside, what the description describes it to be, and what it actually is. I think if you like books about army guys and girls killing things and battling their own problems as well as supernatural ones, you’re going to like this. If you like books that change their entire being in the middle, you’re going to like this. And if you like books that confuse you a little but in a good way, then this is the book for you. 
To read the entire review, you can find it here. 

Burning Sky Makes Another Best of 2018 List

Adman, Bonvivant, and Author, John Hornor Jacobs had his own best list for 2018. Among many illustrious books, he included Burning Sky. Here's what he had to say:
I really enjoyed this book. I’ve said elsewhere that Weston’s short fiction moves with terrifying grace, but his novels have a muscular poetry to them. Burning Sky, his newest novel, moves with urgency and forcefulness with the precision of, well, a military combat team, which just so happens to be the center and beating heart of this fascinating novel. It starts already rolling hard and continues, with some twists and turns and an elegant mystery that sneaks up on you along the way, to a cataclysmically great ending. Ochse’s inclusion of Zoroastrianism (a word, I have learned, I have a terrible time spelling without digital help) is inspired and really caught me in its grasp – I realized how little I actually know about it – so it offers a rich and intricate world for readers to discover, delivered by Weston’s assured voice. Wes makes you care about this menagerie of hard-bit soldiers, drawing you in to feel like you’re part of the team, and then he does horrible things to them. And he fucks with your head while he’s at it. If you like brilliantly rendered military fiction, if you like cosmic horror with new and interesting takes on mythology (seriously, he opens the door a crack for you by the end, exposing the potential for so much more), it’s not a book to be missed. Thankfully, there are more stories coming in this series.
To see his entire list and make sure you have the right books on your TBR, follow this link.  

New Burning Sky Review - Runalong The Shelves

I almost missed this. Thanks to Joe for letting me know about it.

Overall, this is a very positive review, but the reviewer brings up a great point. I'll get to that later. Here's an excerpt from the review over at Runalong The Shelves.

The character dynamic was appealing.  This is a military team with two skilled and respected women operating alongside the men and the men themselves are a diverse group of backgrounds including former criminals and a gay man who again the team have no issues with.  It feels a refreshingly 21st century set-up.  Ultimately the TST enjoy what they do and while they all have their reasons for fighting and it is clear they complement and need each other on a very deep level.
My only reservation was the final reveal is a historical character who really set the ball rolling on the confrontation the team need to address.  That character is shown in a less than positive light and as far as I’ve been able to see he had no ulterior motives and instead is a respected literary figure to Persian culture.  Artistic licence must be expected in the genre but to base a story in Afghanistan and use a famous Muslim character as a potential antagonist (and to be fair their motives are still unclear, so this may be revealed in future stories as a red herring) I felt made this a little out of step with the rest of the book.

So, this is an excellent point. Having just finished the second book, I'm going to include a disclaimer in the acknowledgements. Basically, I had to have a foil for the team. I had to have someone be the bad guys. I chose to make the ultimate bad guy someone who everyone sees as good, because that's just good plotting. To the reviewer's question about it being a red herring, I can convincingly say that it was not and that the next book, Dead Sky, will provide much more reasons for his presence and desire to do what he did. I know this is sort of cryptic, but I don't want to ruin the reading experience for you, but I did want to mention that the reviewers criticism here is valid.

Here is the full review.

Burning Sky Makes Another Best of 2018 List

Thanks to David Agranoff, who besides being a major reviewer in the industry, but is also the founder of the PK Dick Podcast Dickheads. When he puts me on a list, I feel like I've done something right. He placed Burning Sky as number 3 in his top ten. If this was horse racing I would have been in the money.

Here's what Mr. Agranoff- had to say.

Burning Sky is masterpiece that I am more impressed by the longer I think about it. Burning Sky is very much about PTSD, but Burning Sky takes that theme and goes beyond. This novel is about what drives war. It explores the deep trauma not just of the warriors but society. The book points to key moments covered by the news in the last few conflicts that lead to Trauma that we felt collectively. The theme is expressed so beautifully in some of this novel's most horrific moments.

To see the entire list, follow this link here.  

Saturday, October 20, 2018

Five Books About Heroes Who Shouldn’t Babysit Your Kitten

I was asked to write an essay for Tor.com and came up with this brilliant idea. I mean, how many of you have been tempted to let your fictional heroes babysit your kitten? First of all, what were you thinking? Second of all what were you thinking?

Consider this a public service announcement -- Your own PSA to protect your kittens.

Five Books About Heroes Who Shouldn’t Babysit Your Kitten
Who doesn’t like kittens? Kittens are what cats used to be before the irony of a two-legged universe got to them, making them the moody judgmental purring balls of fur they are today. Kittens are fun. Kittens are daring. Kittens are little evil feline ninjas with razor teeth and spikey claws. Kittens wake up every morning and treat the world like it’s their own personal frat house and the air is spiked with catnip. I love kittens. I also love me righteous protagonists in books and comics. So, I was wondering the other day—I’d trust these folks to save the world, but would I trust them to babysit a kitten?

To read the rest, go to Tor.com at this link. 

You won't be disappointed and your kitten will thank you.








Friday, October 19, 2018

How to Connect with Leisure Readers about My Novel Burning Sky

Becky Spratford who is the American Library Association's Superhero and their expert on horror fiction, provided a terrific booklist review of Burning Sky. On her blog RA for All: Training Librarians to Help Leisure Readers she has advice for librarians on how to get certain books into their hands. It occurred to me that this same advice might help folks who have read Burning Sky and loved the book and wanted to find ways to share it.

While I'm going to reference some parts of her post, I'm not going to use it all and I highly encourage you to follow this link and read the entire post. I also encourage you to make RA for All one of your daily readers. If you like books and if you like scary books, there are few better places to go. 

I think my favorite part of it is this: Burning Sky is a love letter to servicemen and women who have toured in Afghanistan.

After a synopsis of the book, she provides a section for you to be able to compare other books to Burning Sky:

Further Appeal: I cannot stress enough how the occult elements here never overwhelm the real life horrors of war, rather they serve to underscore the terror and make it feel even more real. Even readers who usually like realistic military fiction, but want a more modern war setting will enjoy this. The cosmic horror elements are incorporated into the frame of Middle Eastern mythology, and the way Ochse introduces them, it feel real; like it could happen. The pairing of the realism and supernatural is seamless, so much so that it makes the book scarier.

Again with the theme of cosmic horror. It's funny, I didn't set off to write cosmic horror, but that's what I did. Now that I know, I'm actually ratcheting it up for the sequel.
 
Becky Spratford also has a section called Read Alikes that will allow you to compare other books to Burning Sky:
Readalikes: The best match is the Joe Ledger series mentioned above. I also mention Cormac McCarthy because the entire story is framed by the novel Blood Meridian but also, the writing itself is similar. If you like the way McCarthy writes, this novel is a great suggestion.

Fans of literary fiction about war, especially post-9/11 wars and its effects on veterans is also a great option like Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk by Fountain or The Yellow Birds by Powers.

Books set in Afghanistan and told from the local perspective might also be of interest here. Khaled Hosseini is a mainstream option, but check out this page of books tagged “Afghanistan”by readers on Goodreads.

You could also give this book to fans of military SF for which there is A LOT. Again via Goodreads. Really anyone who likes military fiction as it is crafted within any genre might enjoy this novel
I'm always very proud to have my books compared to my friend Jon Maberry's Joe Ledger books. Those are amazing books and share many of the face paced elements we both enjoy.

I was also very pleased to see her mention Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk. I loved that movie before I went to Afghanistan because, more than most any movie, it really showed the repartee and comradeship among a close knit group of soldiers. It also shows how stunning PTSD can be, something I appreciate even more now that I am back. 

If you don't have a copy yet, you can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.



 
Or just hit me up with a question.
 
 
 
 
 

Saturday, September 22, 2018

PK Dick, HP Lovecraft, Cosmic Horror, and Burning Sky

I've met David Agranoff, the reviewer, several times. In all honesty, when I asked him to review Burning Sky I was worried because David knows his shit. He's balls out into the genres and knows how to think and talk critically about all the best and worst books - Where I feel like a blithering idiot when I talk about others books. As it turns out, he loved the book. Fist pump!
him to

We conducted an interview, which you can see here on his podcast called Dickheads, while I was in Astoria convalescing after my return from Afghanistan. He brought up how I must have been heavily influenced by PK Dick because he could see the influences in my writing. Then I flummoxed him by stating that I hadn't read any PK Dick. None. Nada. Zip. I know, I know. My loss. I accept that. I've also never read any Lovecraft, unless you include his essay on the supernatural,  but that doesn't mean I don't understand cosmic horror. Lovecraft didn't invent cosmic horror in the same way that Dick didn't invent conflicting realities. 

Here's something David said about Burning Sky-  
 "This is also a fun novel at times, with entertaining action, monsters, ancient gods and Philip K Dick worthy time shifts and alternate realities that will remind readers in all the right ways of Jacob's Ladder. There is a What the hell is real twist that is so well executed I was shocked when Weston told me in a e-mail that he has not read much PKD. That is a round about way to say this is a mind expanding cross genre read that I can't recommend enough." 
Several reviews have said that Burning Sky is cosmic horror. I had to ask what cosmic horror was. Here are two comments from my FB page:

David Thomas Moore, Editor in Chief of Solaris says:  "It's the category of horror of which Lovecraft is the exemplar: horror in which the supernatural element is existentially threatening, supercontextual and largely - to mortal understanding - incomprehensible. "Cosmic" in scope, as it were."

Marc Weiner says: "Cosmic horror is another way I saying Lovecraftian...which Burning Skies surely was." 

Maybe according to DTM's definition it is.

But is Burning Sky Lovecraftian? I'm not so sure. I certainly never set out to write it that way. Do I have Elder Gods? Sort of. I do lean heavily on Zoroastrian mythology and real history. Are they Elder Gods? Well, they are older than any other mythology, I think, so that definitely makes them older. And being so old, they are also mysterious because we know the least about them.

Here's something else David says about Burning Sky-

"Much like his last Grunt trilogy Burning Sky is very much about PTSD, but Burning Sky takes that theme and goes beyond. This novel is about what drives war. It explores the deep trauma not just of the warriors but society. The book points to key moments covered by the news in the last few conflicts that lead to Trauma that we felt collectively. The theme is expressed so beautifully in some of this novel's most horrific moments. As a writer, reader and fan of Weston I honestly pumped my fist in the air at one of these moments."

Those key moments he's speaking of are the iconic images of the Falling Man, Napalm Girl, and the Burning Monk, which I talk about here. 
 
I urge you to read David's whole review.

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.






Friday, September 21, 2018

First Paragraph of My New Novel 'Burning Sky'

After announcing the signing of a contract for a new mass market paperback to be published by Solaris called Burning Sky. I sat down and wrote the first 1111 words (here and unedited). I discovered that the main character, who is referred to by his team and others as Boy Scout, has an affinity for Cormac McCarthy, Herman Melville, and those books that pit man against nature.

I thought I might share the first paragraph with you.






What Booklist has to say about Burning Sky-


"This dark, twisted, and unnerving cosmic horror is framed by Middle Eastern mythology, with a sense of unease that increases with the relentless pace of the action." - Booklist on Burning Sky


"Without slowing down, Ochse also offers a thoughtful commentary on the human cost of war. This is an excellent example of the emerging genre of military horror, combining details of army life and technical jargon with a well-constructed supernatural thriller." - Booklist on Burning Sky


"Ochse's writing finds the beauty in the language of brutality, which will appeal to fans of Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (1985)." - Booklist on Burning Sky

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.



Thursday, September 20, 2018

"Burning Sky is the beginning of something remarkable... prepare to be astonished."

Mass Movement Magazine recently reviewed Burning Sky and blew the roof off the world.

The review begins with-

"Few authors are capable of successfully combining the established tenets of genre fiction, moulding them and reshaping them and then seamlessly welding them together to create something new, inspiring and unique. Weston Ochse is one of that all too rare breed. Having first become aware of his work via his outstanding Seal Team 666 trilogy and having them moved on to his engrossing Task Force Ombra series, I slowly, but surely, became aware of the fact that Ochse had rapidly become one  of my favourite authors. So it was with great anticipation and much nervous excitement that I began Burning Sky, the first of Ochse’s T.S.T. novels. Six hours later, my mind spent and my imagination locked in overdrive, I read the final line, closed the cover, put Burning Sky  down, made a pot of the strongest Java I had to hand and then started reading Burning Sky again."

I'm always honored when people read my books. After all, I'm a kid from a broken home who didn't have a lot to show for it, joined the army, and puttered away a future that had been pretty bright. That I was able to ressurect it amazes me still. And to have someone re-read by books just blows my mind.

The voice behind Mass Movement Magazine and the reviewer, Tim Cundle, concluded the review saying this-

"If Clive Cussler had a PHD in creative writing and literature and used it to tell tales based around, and upon, the ideas of Phillip Pullman and Richard Morgan, then he’d come close to being half the story-teller and writer that Weston Ochse is. Burning Sky is the beginning of something remarkable. Prepare to be astonished."
Again, blown away.
If you want to read the entire interview, which I urge you to do, please go here.

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.

Wednesday, September 19, 2018

Trigger Warning - Iconic Imagery in Burning Sky

I was recently interviewed by My Life My Book My Escape where I talk about Cormac McCarthy and how iconic images change us. I specifically talk about The Falling Man, Napalm Girl, and the Burning Monk, who are all part of Burning Sky and the idea of them intrinsic to the plot.

We all know how seeing something can change our lives. Many things we've seen we can't unsee. I remember when the video of the poor man being beheaded was being passed around. There were those who would eagerly see it and those like me who wouldn't. My imagination filled in the blanks. I didn't need to see the real thing.

Because I knew it would affect me.

When I was a child I saw both the pictures of the Burning Monk and Napalm Girl in a big Time Life book and they haunted me to this day. Then after 911, the image of the Falling Man came to light. All these images are touchstones to history, mnemonics of how terrible we can be to each other.



Excerpt from Interview:

DJ: What were some of your influences for Burning Sky?

Weston: Cormac McCarthy was a huge influence in the book. His continuing theme of man vs nature and man’s inability to overcome nature is the fulcrum in the novel which the plot circles. I especially mined his masterpiece Blood Meridian, using some of the motifs like how he never names any major character but instead uses titles for them. In Burning Sky, the members of the team are never referred to by their names while in Afghanistan. I also loved the way McCarthy landscaped Blood Meridian and tried to use some of the landscape in Burning Sky as a dark mirror to the McCarthy’s terra damnata. I also mined several cultural icons that when seen, can’t help but bring us memories and stir our thinking. Images such as The Falling Man from the Twin Towers during 9/11, or the Burning Monk and the Napalm Girl from black and white photos from Vietnam. Each one of the images is shorthand to something terrible and I used them as interactive touch points for readers.

If you want to read the entire interview, which I urge you to do, please go here.

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.

Monday, September 17, 2018

Dark, Twisted, and Unverving Cosmic Horror - Booklist on Burning Sky

The review has been published so I can share it now. Booklist loved my new book, which means librarians will love it, which means that readers will as well. I feel like I hit the trifecta.


Burning Sky. By Weston Ochse 
Sept. 2018. 420p. 
Solaris, paper, $14.99 (9781781085295)
The members of the Tactical Support Team (TST), army veterans turned private contractors, sawhorrifying and improbable things on their last assignment in Afghanistan. Now, six months later, these men and women are experiencing things too eerily similar to be classified as PTSD. Ochse (Reign of Evil, 2014), a veteran himself, begins his new military-horror series by unveiling the diverse and complex backstories of the TST before sending them back for the ultimate mission: a fight for their souls. This dark, twisted, and unnerving cosmic horror is framed by Middle Eastern mythology, with a sense of unease that increases with the relentless pace of the action. Without slowing down, Ochse also offers a thoughtful commentary on the human cost of war. This is an excellent example of the emerging genre of military horror, combining details of army life and technical jargon with a well-constructed supernatural thriller. Perfect for readers of Jonathan Maberry’s Joe Ledger series, and Ochse's writing finds the beauty in the language of brutality, which will appeal to fans of Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (1985).  — Becky Spratford for Booklist


Here are some gems that I urge FOWs to share with their own people.

"This dark, twisted, and unnerving cosmic horror is framed by Middle Eastern mythology, with a sense of unease that increases with the relentless pace of the action." - Booklist on Burning Sky

"Without slowing down, Ochse also offers a thoughtful commentary on the human cost of war. This is an excellent example of the emerging genre of military horror, combining details of army life and technical jargon with a well-constructed supernatural thriller." - Booklist on Burning Sky

"Ochse's writing finds the beauty in the language of brutality, which will appeal to fans of Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (1985)." - Booklist on Burning Sky

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.

Sunday, September 2, 2018

Appearances and Signing Tour for Burning Sky

My publicist and I set up a few appearances for Burning Sky. If you are in the Southwestern United States and are a bookstore, library, or reading/writing group, I can make an appearance. If you want me at your fav bookstore library, help me set it up. For now, here's what I have. Mark you calendar.

29 Sep - 1400-1500 Mysterious Galaxy, San Diego, CA
30 Sep - 1600-1700 Dark Delicacies, Burbank, CA
01 Oct - 1700-1600 Space Cowboy Books, Joshua Tree, CA
05 Oct - 1700-1800 Barnes and Nobles East Side, Tucson AZ
06 Oct - 1200-1300 Poisened Pen, Scottsdale, AZ
13 Oct - 1300-1430 Dusenberry-River Library, Tucson, AZ
09 Nov - TusCon Convention, Tucson, AZ
10 Nov - TusCon Convention, Tucson, AZ
11 Nov - TusCon Convention, Tucson, AZ
17 Nov - 1400-1530 Himmel Park Library, Tucson, AZ


I'll update this as new dates and times appear, but for now, plan on this.

And if you have tons of cash and tons of money, I will fly anywhere at anytime and appear anyplace. 

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.




Friday, August 31, 2018

Tor Announces September Releases of Horror Books

Tor dot Com just announced the September Releases of Horror Books and it looks like September is going to be a fabulous month. My friend and former editor of my SEAL Team 666 books, Brendan Deneen, starts the month out with his second novel The Chrysalis. I end the month with my new military horror novel Burning Sky.

So what's in the middle of this genre-bending hydrox cookie? Here's a sampling, but for the full list, go here.

The Chrysalis—Brendan Deneen (September 4, Tor Books)
Barely employed millennials Tom and Jenny Decker have to grow up fast when they lose their cheap Manhattan apartment. Leaving the city is hard, but the blow is softened when they stumble upon a surprisingly affordable house in the suburbs. For Tom, the bills, the mortgage, and Jenny’s unexpected pregnancy add up to terror. Then he finds the thing in the basement. It makes him feel like a winner even as it scrambles his senses. A new job soon has him raking in the big bucks—enough that Jenny can start making her entrepreneurial dreams come true. The Deckers’ dream home conceals more than one deadly secret. As Tom’s obsession with the basement grows, Jenny realizes that to save her family, she must expose everything. Before it destroys them all.

The Land of Somewhere Safe—Hal Duncan (September 4, NewCon Press)
The Land of Somewhere Safe: where things go when you think, “I must put this somewhere safe,” and then can never find them again. The Scruffians: irreverent foul-mouthed street urchins, older than their years, waifs who have been Fixed by the Stamp, frozen so that they are immortal, providing perpetual slave labour. But now the waifs have nicked the Stamp and burned down the Institute that housed it, preventing any more of their number being Fixed and exploited. Peter and Lilly: two school kids orphaned by Nazi bombs, who find themselves thrown together by circumstance and evacuated from London during the Blitz. Sent far further north than intended, all the way to the Isle of Skye, they are taken in by Clan Chief Lady Morag MacGuffin of Dunstravaigin Castle. With them are the four Bastable children – a jolly queer bunch – who prove to be far more than they seem. The Reverend Blackstone: no real reverend at all, but an occultish Nazi spy determined to get his hands on the priceless Stamp, even if he has to raise hisself a demon to do so…

Flight or Fright—Stephen King & Bev Vincent, editors (September 4, Cemetery Dance)
Stephen King hates to fly. Now he and co-editor Bev Vincent would like to share this fear of flying with you. Welcome to Flight or Fright, an anthology about all the things that can go horribly wrong when you’re suspended six miles in the air, hurtling through space at more than 500 mph and sealed up in a metal tube with hundreds of strangers. All the ways your trip into the friendly skies can turn into a nightmare, including some we’ll bet you’ve never thought of before but now you will the next time you walk down the jetway and place your fate in the hands of a total stranger. Featuring brand new stories by Joe Hill and Stephen King, as well as fourteen classic tales and one poem from the likes of Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury, Roald Dahl, Dan Simmons, and many others.

Daemon Voices: On Stories and Storytelling—Philip Pullman (September 18, Knopf)
Nonfiction. From the internationally best-selling author of the His Dark Materials trilogy, a spellbinding journey into the secrets of his art—the narratives that have shaped his vision, his experience of writing, and the keys to mastering the art of storytelling. One of the most highly acclaimed and best-selling authors of our time now gives us a book that charts the history of his own enchantment with story—from his own books to those of Blake, Milton, Dickens, and the Brothers Grimm, among others—and delves into the role of story in education, religion, and science. At once personal and wide-ranging, Daemon Voices is both a revelation of the writing mind and the methods of a great contemporary master, and a fascinating exploration of storytelling itself.

Burning Sky—Weston Ochse (September 25, Solaris)
Everything is dangerous in Afghanistan, nothing more so than the mission of a Tactical Support Team or T.S.T. All veterans, these men and women spend seasons in hell, to not only try and fix what’s broken in each of them, but also to make enough bank to change their fortunes. But seven months later, safely back on American soil, they feel like there’s something left undone. They’re meeting people who already know them, remembering things that haven’t happened, hearing words that don’t exist. And they’re all having the same dream… a dream of a sky that won’t stop burning.

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.





Thursday, August 30, 2018

Is Military Horror Too Much of a Niche?

"Burning Sky is masterpiece that I am more impressed with the longer I think about it. If you like your horror, political and thoughtful, I would say you should pre-order this novel. It will be on my best of the year list for sure." - Postcards from a Dying World

David Agranoff is proprietor of Postcards from a Dying World and the PK Dick Podcast known as Dickheads. He reads heavily in the genre and is one of the most thoughtful and intelligent readers I know, so to have him say those words is immensely humbling.

This is the second review in for Burning Sky. The first review called Burning Sky the pinnacle of the military horror genre. Now on the heels of that to have it being called a masterpiece can't help but make me smile. Too often, during the cold dark moments of writing a novel alone -- months and months of self-doubt- to know that you connected with some people on the DNA level is wonderful.

Will this last? Will every review be so great? Probably not. The odds are that there will be some who won't like it. Plus, and let's face it, the military horror genre isn't for everyone. I have niched myself inside the seventh and smallest of a Russian nesting doll. If people look askance at the horror genre, what will they think about MILITARY horror?

But they say "write what you know," so at least for the time being, I'm the flag bearer. My hopes is that some out there will try military horror and see that the best of them are more about the cost of war than the glorification of it. The best of them are about how a man or woman shuffles through a life made harder by what they were forced to do and survives despite the emotional and physical scars visited upon them. Isn't that what literature is all about?

I urge you to read the whole review.

Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.





Saturday, August 11, 2018

Burning Sky Represents the Pinnacle of the Military Horror Genre

...so says Sci-Fi and Fantasy Reviewer in the first review of Burning Sky, my 30th published book and the start of a new military horror trilogy.

Wow. What a humbling and inspiring review. The reviewer went into incredible detail, laying the foundation for his approach to the novel and then how it affected him as he read it.

"When I started to read Burning Sky I assumed that I would be looking at a fairly ‘conventional’ horror novel with a military theme – perhaps some kind of ‘creature feature’ that saw the TST members hunt down some occult or extra-terrestrial threat in the deserts of Afghanistan. But as I read on, it rapidly became clear that although there were elements of this, it was actually so much more than the sort of pot-boiler that often litters the genres. Instead, what Mr Ochse offers up is an open and starkly honest portrayal of the mental and physical costs of fighting in a modern conflict, which in turn becomes subtly integrated with elements of cosmic and body horror as time goes on."

When an author sits alone for months writing a novel in the squishy silence of his own brain, he never knows if what he's trying to do will actually translate to the page. Even as I sat in Afghanistan and began working with Rebellion's publicist, laying our scheme for sending out review copies of the book, I doubted myself and the idea that I might have captured the right electric pain in the bottle.

"Burning Sky is a fantastic novel that I enjoyed every minute of reading – engagingly written, sharply plotted and laced with both cosmic horrors and the entirely human-made horrors of modern war. I firmly believe that it represents the pinnacle of the military horror genre, and will be difficult, if not impossible, to surpass."


I urge you to read the review. I don't know who the reviewer was, but as an author who has had hundreds if not thousands of reviews, I can count on one hand the sorts of reviews that read like the best of creative non-fiction. This was one of them and should be a tutorial on how reviews should be written.


Burning Sky will be available September 25th. Please pre-order so we can sell out the print run before publication. That will help guarantee more books in the series. You can click on one of the book links on the left, or go to the following links for your favorite stores.


Thank you!

Tuesday, May 24, 2016

New Book Contract - Burning Sky (Solaris)

Just signed a contract with Solaris Books for a novel called BURNING SKY. It's about an O.S.T. or Operational Support Team. OST is the movement security detail for VIPs within Afghanistan. Comprised of active duty military, civilians, and contractors, all veterans of military police, security services, special operations units, and other combat agencies, these men and women spend seasons in hell to, not only try and fix what’s broken in each of them, but also to make enough bank to change their futures. They are  stress junkies and the world is better for it. But seven months after their last mission, safely back on American soil, Land of the Big PX, they feel like they've left something undone... like maybe even they've left something or someone behind. And the feeling is driving them crazy. One by one they come together, and discover that they've all been having the same dream... a dream of a woman, a goat, and a sky that won't stop burning.

I orginally wrote this pitch in the fall of 2013. Several other houses looked at it and it wasn't until Solaris looked at it that it found a home. Thank you Solaris. I think I've made an impression there. The fine men and women who work at Solaris know I do a quality job and get the work in on time. From Grunt Life to Grunt Traitor to Grunt Hero, and then back to Blood Ocean and Empire of Salt. Although the latter two were with Abaddon Books, I'm working with the same editors, so this will make six books with them. Natch!

What's interesting about the pitch, is I never name any of the characters. Instead, I labeled them by their archetype (e.g. Boy Scout, Preacher's Daughter, Narco, etc). Now I get the fun of naming them.

The book is scheduled for release sometime between Fall 2017 and Summer 2018. It will be published in the UK in trade paperback and in the US in mass market paperback.