Book III of The Pulse Series is Available to Preorder Now

Those of you who have read my 2012 novel, The Pulse, know that there is lots of sailing action and adventure in this story of a man who is stranded in the Caribbean far from his only daughter when a series of solar flares takes down the power and communications grid. The story continued in Book II of the series, Refuge, which was published last year, and now Book III, Voyage After the Collapse will soon be released and is available for preorder now. 

Here is the official description:

BOOK III OF THE PULSE SERIES—A STORY OF SURVIVAL IN THE AFTERMATH OF MASSIVE SOLAR FLARES THAT DESTROY THE POWER, COMMUNICATIONS AND TRANSPORTATION GRIDS, BRINGING ABOUT A DESCENT INTO LAWLESS CHAOS AND UNBRIDLED SAVAGERY.

The crew of the sailing vessel, Casey Nicole has endured a harrowing ordeal on the dark waterways of the coastal swamps near New Orleans, but Artie Drager has escaped with what he came for—his only daughter, Casey.

They are free of the mainland but still too close for comfort. Now the crew of six aboard the big catamaran must plot a course and set sail into the unknown, hoping to find a place where the impact of the electromagnetic pulse was not so severe. Where that will be, they have no way of knowing. Did the solar flares impact the whole planet, or just the parts of the Western Hemisphere they have seen?

Voyage After the Collapse is a passage of hope into an uncertain future, leaving the terror of the U.S. mainland astern in the wake.

You can preorder the book now for $3.99. The release date is set for December 16, but I expect to see it released sooner, hopefully in November. Reserve your copy at the link below. You won't be charged until the book is actually released and delivered to your Kindle or other ebook reading device. A paperback edition will also be available around the same time the Kindle edition is released.

Voyage After the Collapse (Book III of The Pulse Series)

Book Giveaway: The Sequel to The Pulse

Time marches on and it seems hard to believe that it's been over two years since my first novel, The Pulse was published in the summer of 2012.  I posted about it here before it was released because although it is a work of dsytopian fiction, most of the story involved sailing a long and dangerous passage with no electronic instruments or aids to navigation in the wake of a solar flare that shuts down the power grid:

http://scottsboatpages.blogspot.com/2012/06/post-apocalyptic-sailing.html

The Pulse was a big success when it was released in 2012, for awhile getting into the top 300 books on Amazon, and I wanted to immediately write the sequel because I ended the first book with a sequel and even a series in mind.  Working with a publisher can prove incredibly frustrating though, as in their infinite wisdom they delayed offering me a contract for the sequel for more than a year and instead insisted I do a parallel story for young adults set in the same world.  While The Darkness After was also a fun project to write and was a success as well, that story did not involve sailing and the publication schedule delayed the writing of the sequel to The Pulse much longer than I would have liked.  But finally, the book was completed earlier this year and Refuge After the Collapse has now been printed will be available on or before September 23.  The story picks up with Larry Drager, anchored in the remote Honey Island Swamp near New Orleans in his big Wharram catamaran.  I hope those of you who read and enjoyed the first book will check it out and I apologize for the long delay.  This won't happen again as I calling all the shots with my book publishing from this point forward.

I wanted to post this to Scott's Boat Pages today in order to give readers of this blog who may not follow my other sites an opportunity to enter a book giveaway for Refuge that will end around the 23rd.  The giveaway is for 10 signed copies to be mailed to the winners, and all you have to do to enter is sign up for my opt-in newsletter by entering your first name and email address in the form linked below.  Your email address won't be shared and you won't get a bunch of junk email from me, only the occasional book giveaway or new release announcement like this one.  After you enter by submitting the form, be sure and check your inbox and spam folders for the confirmation email, because if you don't click on it to opt in, you won't be officially entered:

Scott B. Williams Email Newsletter Signup

If this link doesn't work for some reason, you can also find the signup form under the Newsletter tab in the menu at the top of this page. I'm currently working on another novel about cruising on a sailboat and I'll look forward to keeping my newsletter readers informed about the upcoming release that will be happening later this year.  

Cool Gear Received:

I've got some new stuff in the mail to test and write about in the upcoming weeks.  First, I was offered a pair of Margaritaville polarized sunglasses from the Margaritaville Store: 

 

This style is the Havana, which retails for $159.95 and appears to be well-made.  I've been wearing them everyday for driving and find them comfortable and the optics good.  I'll put them to the test in the coming weeks with a couple of sea kayaking trips on the Gulf coast, and see how well the polarization works to reduce the glare.  This is a good time of year to test that, as the air is clear and the light seems to be at it's brightest - making it a great time of year for coastal photography as well.  I'll let you know what I think of the sunglasses here when I've had time to really evaluate them, but I can say at this point that I already like them a lot, and they come with some nice accessories, like a microfiber cleaning bag, an integrated leash system, and a nice zippered, hardshell case to protect them.  Oh, and the palm tree logos on the ear pieces and lenses are a nice touch too.

I've also got a couple of gear reviews to do for Sea Kayaker magazine.  One will be a round-up of the latest chart-enabled hand-held GPS units that I will get started on as soon as they are sent from the manufacturers.  In the meantime, I'll be testing several different water filtration packs by Hydration Technology Systems.  Of particular interest is the SeaPack Crew Emergency Desalination Pouch, which could be a good back-up system for sea kayakers and a valuable addition to a ditch bag or life-raft for sailors:

I'll be testing these to see if they work as advertised, and when the article is published in Sea Kayaker, I'll post a link to it here. 

Bug Out Vehicles and Shelters: My Latest Book Now Available

I've neglected my posting on this site for way too long, and part of the reason is that I've been so busy writing books.  This has been my busiest year ever as an author, with two new non-fiction books released and a contract to write a novel that has to be completed by February.  All of these new titles are in the currently exploding survival genre, but these latest ones also offer a lot to anyone interested in boats.  Just last week, Bug Out Vehicles and Shelters: Build and Outfit Your Life-Saving Escape was released, and despite the cover image, it contains three chapters on waterborne transportation, as I am of the persuasion that in most situations boats are better options for evacuating danger zones than land vehicles.

Chapter Three: Bug Out Boats covers the kind of vessels I consider "escape watercraft".  That is, both power and sailing craft that can quickly get you out of a danger zone while carrying everything you need to survive, yet are not large enough to offer self-contained, long-term accommodations.  These boats include beach cruisers you camp out of, rather than in, and fast runabouts that quickly get you to a safer location in situations where you may not have time to stop overnight at all.

Chapter Six:  Liveaboard Boats is in the section of the book dedicated to mobile retreats.  This kind of boat provides a platform for long-term survival as well as transportation.  Vessels suited for both protected brownwater cruising and offshore bluewater voyaging are included here, with an emphasis on simplicity, seaworthiness and reasonable cost.  Outfitting and setting up such a boat as a mobile bug-out retreat is not much different than preparing for any type of long-term cruising in possibly remote locations, but special considerations for this use are pointed out. 

Chapter Nine:  Human-Powered Watercraft covers canoes, sea kayaks and rowing vessels, as this type of boat can navigate waterways beyond the reach of larger vessels and access remote wilderness areas where safe retreat locations can be found, as well as natural resources for survival.  In the event of some kind of sustained shut down of the power and conventional transportation grid, such craft may be the most viable means of travel - especially if stealth and a low profile is needed.

I won't go into many details about the novel project at this point, but I will say that a Wharram catamaran features prominently in the story line.  This should probably be expected by long-time readers here, who by now know about my enduring fascination with these Polynesian-style catamarans.  A Reuel Parker schooner is also in the story, and a good bit of sailing and passage-making is part of the plot.  

The other non-fiction book: Getting Out Alive: 13 Deadly Scenarios and How Others Survived was published back in March this year, and so is not news, but since it was not mentioned here before, I thought I should do so now as it also has some chapters to offer boating enthusiasts.  There's a scenario on surviving a hurricane aboard a sailboat, a scenario in which ill-prepared power boaters get swept out to sea in the Gulf Stream, and a modern-day marooning on a deserted Pacific atoll.  All these situations include real-life accounts of people who have actually survived (or perished) in similar scenarios.