Ballacourage Books

09/06/2026

Ah my friends, there is a new book. Its making it's way through the never ending process. It is not an Old Guy book, but is kind of- sort of in the same universe. Mostly. But it is fun.

The thing is we're making one last try to get it in front of a real agent. One had been interested, but she retired, or something. Tim really wants to see what will happen if it, by sheer luck, get's into a decent publisher. Which is almost impossible these days as everyone keeps flooding everyone with AI and poorly written crap.

So of course if anyone knows a friend of a friend that is a literary agent, please drop us a line.

But I'll leak the title at least - The School for Weapons Systems.

06/08/2026

What? another book you ask? Well, come to think of it there just might be. Not an Old Guy book, but kind of a spin off.

Unfortunately, the great Tim really wants to try and have this one go through a 'real publisher' (for fun's sake') but one cannot do so without going through an agent, and agents hide under rocks so as not to be bombarded by masses of crap AI submissions. So we are giving it a little time to just make sure someone can't shake an agent out of the trees that would at least listen to the pitch.

05/20/2026

It's interesting that sales of the Graven Moon are well below any of the Old Guy books. But what is more interesting to me is that among all the 5 star reviews (thank you) is one 2-star review. Which is fine if that is what you think, but the actual comment is "I thoroughly enjoyed this book. One story was the saddest story I’ve ever read. I almost wish I had skipped that one, but at the same time it is my favorite. Others made laugh and some gave things to think about."

I just do not understand how that becomes a 2 star review. It's probably a mistake, but of course we can't really do anything about it. So if 'Eddie' is out there and did make a mistake... otherwise, I guess a 4.7 rating is more believable than a 5.0.

We have no released a paper copy of the book as we weren't sure the demand was out there. If someone is actually waiting for that, leave a comment here. It might light a fire under my butt.

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09/08/2025

If any of you wan to watch a short interview with Tim Gawne on his 'Day Job' which involves understanding myopia, he was just featured on a professional website for vision professionals.

Tim Gawne, PhD, is a professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. In this interview, he discusses how chromatic cues can guide human eye growth. 

04/14/2025

The first actual rating of Graven Moon is in at Amazon. It is, of course 5 stars !. Sadly, that reader did not leave an actual review. But it is worth pointing out that honest reviews and ratings are quite important in today's literary world. Please take a moment to leave one, even if you didn't like it. All we ask is that if you leave a poor review, you at least explain why in a review.

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03/12/2025

The link to Graven moon on amazon is https://amzn.to/427YWiT

Tim Gawne is best known for his series of science fiction books about 'Old Guy': a giant cybertank with a mind of his own, in the far future where cybertanks have their own civilization. Here, many for the first time, is a collection of his short stories, many never before published. This include...

03/10/2025

Yes, The Graven Moon is up for pre-sale at Amazon. Mainly as we accidentally checked pre-sale and now can't retract it. It releases on March 12th, so only a few days. As stated before- it's a bunch of never before seen Gawne stories, some were previously published in obscure publications. THREE of them are Old Guy stories, and then there is a pretty good Novella called 'The One Law' Plans are to release it as an ebook in Smashwords next, and then work on the (painful) process of turning it into a real paperback book.

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01/14/2025

11/20/2024

Did you know that using AI to do book covers is not as easy as one would think? In case you wonder, this is a hint.

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02/14/2024

Something is in the works. In honor of that we have made a coupon for the rest of Feb for a FREE ebook copy of the Chronicles of Old Guy at Smashwords.

use coupon code at check out RR8K6

In the distant future mankind creates sentient cybertanks patterned on the human brain to help fight their alien enemies. Then, inexplicably, the humans vanished. They just went away. All that is left of the human empire are the cybertanks who, in their own way, keep the human civilization alive.