Void Drifter 4: Coming to an Eardrum Near You

Exciting news: Void Drifter 4’s audiobook is available for pre-order on Audible! At least, I’m told it's exciting. I’m also told I wrote it, which I’m choosing to believe despite mounting evidence that it may have been authored by a slightly more productive version of myself that existed sometime in 2024.

Allow me to share the peculiar temporal anomaly that is the writer’s marketing calendar. I am currently called upon to enthusiastically promote a book I co-wrote so long ago that my memories of it have fled to the part of my brain than vaguely remembers the color palettes associated with my toddlerhood. Meanwhile, my conscious mind is entirely consumed by the Beta project that paid subscribers are currently reading—a manuscript so fresh in my mind that I sometimes accidentally call my children by character names at dinner. “Pass the salt, Lieutenant Explosivo.”

The cognitive dissonance is nothing short of spectacular. Imagine throwing a dinner party where half the guests are your current friends and the other half are people you met in junior high. Now imagine having to introduce them all to each other while pretending you definitely remember everyone’s dietary restrictions and relationship status.

When asked to discuss Void Drifter 4, my brain performs an elaborate synchronized swimming routine of panic, desperately paddling through murky waters of half-remembered plot points. “Ah yes, Will! My good friend Will! Who... did... that thing... with the... stuff.” *Frantically skims paperback version under the table*

The publishing industry operates on a timeline that can only be described as “chronologically absurdist.” I have now reached the point where I am simultaneously:

• Promoting a book I wrote during a previous presidential administration

• Editing a book I wrote last season

• Writing a new book that exists primarily as coffee stains and Post-it notes

• Mentally outlining a book that future-me will someday stare at in bewilderment

So yes! Void Drifter 4! A masterpiece of science fiction that I absolutely recall writing and definitely remember the ending of! Pre-order it on Audible immediately, before I forget it exists again!

For those who prefer their entertainment in static image form rather than acoustic waves, please enjoy these meticulously crafted memes, created during what I describe to my wife as “productive avoidance.”

I think we can agree that everyone emerges victorious from this scenario—except perhaps my increasingly concerned literary agent, who recently asked if I could “please, for the love of bookmarks, remember at least the names of my main characters during interviews.”

WHEN I COMPARE MY MEMORY TO A GOLDFISH

I may have stolen the last meme, but all this marketing makes such petty theft almost required.

From the increasingly fragmented side of the page,

A person who is almost certainly… Jason Anspach