Ilsa J. Bick is a child psychiatrist, a surgeon wannabe, former Air Force major, and an award-winning, best-selling author of short stories, ebooks and novels. Ilsa has written extensively in the Star Trek, Mechwarrior, Battletech and Shadowrun universes, and her original stories have appeared in many print and online venues. Notably, “The Key,” a supernatural murder-mystery, was named “distinguished” in The Best American Mystery Stories, 2005 (edited by Joyce Carol Oates).  A sequel, “Second Sight,” appeared in Crime Spells (ed. Martin H. Greenberg and Loren L. Coleman; 2009); Locus’s Rich Horton not only called the tale “the best (in the anthology) . . . heady and involving . . .” but included “Second Sight” as recommended reading in the forthcoming Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy, 2010.

Forthcoming novels are:
DRAW THE DARK (Carolrhoda Lab; October, 2010): a YA paranormal mystery of a teen who reveals dark secrets through his paintings—including the day the Nazis came to a small Wisconsin town. Under the title, Stalag Winter, DRAW was a semifinalist for the 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award and called “inventive” and “riveting” by Publisher’s Weekly.

SIN-EATER (Carolrhoda Lab; 2011): a gritty, YA mystery revolving around an illicit photo, gay bashing, and murder; also from Carolrhoda Lab.

ASHES: the first volume of a YA dystopian trilogy which begins when an electromagnetic pulse sweeps through the sky, killing the vast majority of the world’s population and zapping every electronic device. Everyone still alive changes considerably—some for the better, most for the worst. ASHES is slated to appear in October, 2011 from Egmont USA.

Drop on by www.ilsajbick.com to learn more.

Michael A. Stackpole is an award-winning game designer, computer game designer, podcaster, novelist, graphic novelist, editor and screenwriter. He’s one of the creators of The Chain Story project. This story is the first featuring Jack Card. Mike conceived of a series of stories that would be a cross between Encyclopedia Brown mysteries and the Skeptical work done by men like James Randi. He wrote it as a YA story, hoping that a series of such tales might interest younger readers and get them thinking critically.

You can learn more about Mike and his work at his website, Stormwolf.com

Donald J. Bingle is an oft-published author in the science fiction, fantasy, horror, thriller, and comedy genres. Having tackled near-future military science fiction with his first novel, Forced Conversion, and extremism and global warming in his second novel, GREENSWORD, Bingle is currently putting the finishing touches on his first espionage thriller. Don’s “signature dark humor” and twisting plots can be found in an eclectic menagerie of stories on demand in such anthologies as Timeshares, Zombie Raccoons and Killer Bunnies, Imaginary Friends, Slipstreams, Transformers Legends, Fellowship Fantastic, All Hell Breaking Loose, Fantasy Gone Wrong, and the upcoming Steampunk’d. He is an active panelist in many of the seminars of the GenCon Writers Symposium.

You can learn more about Donald and his work at his website, donaldjbingle.com

Magic forms the basis of the Contagious Magic novels and stories by author Michael Jasper. This story explains one element of the secret history of magic, documenting the real cause of one of the biggest tragedies in America’s past. You can read more about the title character of this story in the first Contagious Magic novel, A Sudden Outbreak of Magic, which takes place over a hundred years later. The novel deals with how magic shows up again in the modern world, after decades of lying dormant and unused. Magic is like that, you know. Unpredictable, ubiquitous, and dangerous.

Michael Jasper is the author of three published novels and a story collection, as well as over four dozen published stories. You can learn more about Michael and his work at his website, michaeljasper.net

Bruce C Davis is a science fiction author who practices as a trauma surgeon in his spare time. The Master Blaster and the Tiger of Chinatown is his first story written for The Chain Story, and his first foray into this Edwardian time line. William Trimble is the Zhadou Shifu, the Master Blaster. Forced to flee his beloved China after the Boxer Uprising, his name blackened by the horrific deaths of hundreds of civilians in an explosion he couldn’t prevent, he reaches San Francisco and safety. Or so he thinks until he is Shanghaied on the streets of Chinatown. He is rescued by a strange being from beneath the city streets, but his salvation is not guaranteed until he faces the evil behind his abduction- the mysterious assassin known as the Manchu.

You can learn more about Bruce and his work at his website: Thatwhichishuman.com

The goal of the project is to provide readers with exciting, professional-quality stories by the best of the writers working today. I’m lucky enough that I know a lot of writers. Many of them have generously pledged to lend their time and effort to this project. The people I’ve talked with are all published, most many times over, and a significant number have won awards for their writing. It’s pretty much an All-Star crew of writers who write for a living and know how to tell a good story.

The Chain Story is by invitation only. There’s a practical reason for that, which probably has occurred to most folks already. If I opened it up to submissions, the mailboxes would overflow, the server would melt for the traffic, and I’d burn a year’s worth of bandwidth in the blink of an eye. I’m pretty certain that I couldn’t get through all the submissions and still have time to write the books I have to write.

This doesn’t mean that it’s impossible for an unpublished writer to get an invitation. I’m in the process of talking with a number of people and groups who are willing to work with those who want to submit to the project. If I get a recommendation from any of these folks, I will be happy to consider a story for inclusion.

Next Wednesday, 12 May 2010, starting at 6 PM Pacific time, I’ll talk more about author screening. The discussion will take place during my office hours in Second Life. Second Life is free, graphically-based chat software which supports voice-chat. I’ve been using it for over two years now for readings, classes and chatting with folks. I hold weekly Office Hours in which we discuss all sorts of things, including The Chain Story, the publishing industry and vexing problems that plague writers.

Once you’ve downloaded and installed the software, and registered with Second Life, click this link to be teleported to where I hold office hours.

Given all the inquiries, and the new questions that will arise as others are answered, handling this in a live voice chat is the best way to go. Also, the Fantasy and Science Fiction Writers’ workshop we host in Second Life has commited to working with writers who want to submit to The Chain Story. Actively participating in the world will be helpful every step of the way.

Your interest and enthusiasm are what will make this project successful. Thank you for sharing and Tweeting and Facebooking and everything else to get the word out. The more readers we have, the more work we can use, and that’s a win for everyone involved.

Nathan Long is a screenwriter and novelist living in Hollywood, California. He is best known for the cult classic sci-fi monster movie Guyver II, and for the sword and sorcery novels he writes in the Warhammer universe. These include the Blackhearts trilogy, and the continuing adventures of Gotrek and Felix. Working Stiffs is the first published adventure of Reginald Asteroth-Phipps, consulting occultist, a Victorian gentleman who takes the cases too weird for more respectable detectives to sully their reputations with.

You can learn more about Nathan and his work at his website: sabrepunk.com

Robert E Vardeman is the author of over two hundred novels, including the novelization of the Sony PlayStation videogame God of War. In addition, he has published scores of short stories, of which “White Fur” is now one. This story originally was written in 1981 for a proposed anthology, Spicy Jungle Stories, which never saw the light of day. Rewritten for The Chain Story, it introduces the somewhat reluctant explorer Abigail Morrison and her strange adventures in the Yucatan jungles. While not a member of the Wanderers Club, she can still contribute future stories of archeological oddities.

You can learn more about Robert and his work at his website, www.cenotaphroad.com

Jeffrey J. Mariotte is the award-winning author of more than forty novels, including Cold Black Hearts, River Runs Red, and Missing White Girl, and dozens of comic books. Among those comic books are Desperadoes, a long-running Western/horror series featuring Gideon Brood, ex-Texas Ranger and stock detective. Gideon Brood’s great grandson, cowboy actor Cody Landers (star of 1961′s hit TV series Medicine Bow), makes his debut appearance in “The Unpleasantness at the Circle P”–a tale of B movie cowboys, fistfights, phonies and frauds, and mysteries from beyond the boundaries of life and death. And don’t forget Geronimo, the Equine Marvel!

You can learn more about Jeffrey at his website, www.jeffmariotte.com.

Michael A. Stackpole is a New York times Bestselling author of over forty novels, including I, Jedi and Rogue Squadron. Night of the Rat God is his first story for The Chain Story. It’s also the first story involving Doctor Nathaniel Charon, a character which has slowly been maturing in the back of his mind. Charon first appeared as an adventurer whose travels resulted in a collection of oddities which formed a museum in Second Life. From writing five paragraph micro-tales, Mike has progressed into doing full-blown novellas and has outlined a number of novels for Dr. Charon and his comrades.

You can learn more about Michael and his work at his website, Stormwolf.com.