In 2014 I should be able to get back the rights to my 2007 novel Aeroquest. I would very much like to re-work it and publish it again. It was a kind of original project that was not created solely by me. In the 1980’s and 1990’s I played role-playing games with boys that needed a mentor. I began with the Dungeons and Dragons game from TSR. But South Texas has a strong Baptist presence that fears imagination, especially if it involves dragons and demons. So I had to change it to a Star Wars inspired game called Traveller. With a star-spanning fictional empire and a band of dice-rolled characters, we conquered the galaxy together for about one hundred and fifty game years. I used my story-telling abilities to carry the game forward and keep the boys enthralled.
So, the characters in the book are not completely created by me. They reflect the qualities, manners, and choices of the players. Even the most important character, the teacher-hunter-explorer-hero Ged Aero, was created by someone else (although I have for the most part made him into me). The story is overly complex because it was directed by the players and the decisions they made as they tried to solve the problems the game master (me) put in front of them. I think I can fix that given time. I should never have tried to publish it when I did, but the Publish America company gave me the chance to publish for free and tempted me in ways I never should’ve fallen for. I am glad I didn’t try to do this with more important stories that I was working on at the time.
Central to the story is the space school in which Ged Aero teaches. It is on the oriental planet called Gaijin (the word in Japanese for stupid foreigner). It is a special school. Ged’s is the only class, and all the students have special abilities, mind powers, that are like Ged’s own shape-shifting ability. There are telepaths, telekinetics, kids who mentally control the heat and cold in the air, teleport, mentally change molecules, and even foretell the future.
I don’t recommend you buy the book as it is now (a strange bit of advice from a starving artist and author) but I hope to one day turn it into something much better, more entertaining, and worth reading.
The Paffooney that accompanies today’s post is a class picture of all but three of the teenage Psionic space ninjas.
Catch a Falling Star 
For what it’s worth the idea interests me, but I’ve got a bit of a weakness for (presumably) pleasant juvenile adventures with things like plant-creatures and humanoids of non-human skin colors and things like that. In the bottom picture is the sword-holding woman’s arm some sort of slinky-like prosthetic?
No, it’s her mutant power to propel things at high speed. The special armor is designed to prevent her from breaking her arm. The evil throckpod flower-guy is about to get a high-powered finger to the forehead. Amazing that I can remember all that from the silly role-playing game.