Why the name?
Major General Stanley was a character in the Gilbert & Sullivan operetta The Pirates of Penzance. He was the spry character with the patter song typical in a Gilbert & Sullivan work. His seminal song was: "I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General", a snappy patter song in which the good Major General confesses that his military knowledge "...though plucky and adventury has only come down to the beginning of the century..." - recall that this was written near the end of the 19th Century.

I have done miniatures gaming for more than 40 years. My on-going persona was originally Major General Stanley, but after a miniatures battle (25mm Napoleonics if you must know), troops under the good Major General successfully stormed the town of Umbrage. I announced that he was now Lord Stanley of Umbrage, having successfully taken Umbrage (puns are rife in our gaming group), and as such he remains today.

My Interests
First, Writing. Fiction writing, specifically, science fiction and mystery. I currently have two novels out. One, Firestar, is a military Science Fiction story, and is in the hands of two different agents. It is the first novel of a trilogy. The other, Cross Time Cop, is a thriller/adventure story that goes to different timelines (alternate histories). I also have at least one short story being considered by a magazine. I have two other completed novels (aside from the Firestar Trilogy); one is an occult detective story featuring a near-immortal detective, a really pissed off Greek Goddess, voodoo, organized crime, drugs, murder and political corruption entitled Kassandra's Song. It was a finalist in the Pacific Northwet Writer's Association fiction contest in 2005. The other is Counterfeit Line about a modern police detective who gets thrown into an alternate history (about 1895 local) where the American Revolution did not occur. I have hopes for both of them.

Second (and much less these days), historical miniatures gaming. Periods include: 15mm Napoleonics, 15mm Pike & Shot, 15mm Ancients, 15mm ACW, 15mm Marlburian, 15mm Seven Years War, and 6mm Napoleonics on land; 1/2400 WW1 and pre-dreadnoughts, 1/??? Greek Galleys (they're small), and my newest interest: aeronauts, i.e. bicycle powered dirigibles circa the 1880s. I have paper models from Riveresco that I am assembling for aeronaut racing.

Rules? Pike & Shot: King's War. 6mm Napoleonics Little Big Battles. 15mm Ancients: Hordes of the Things. WW1/pre-dreadnought Naval: General Quarters 2. Galleys: something I got off the web (note, my ambition is to do Salamis on a 1:2 scale, and for that you need something simple). 15mm ACW, Napoleonics, and Marlburians, Volley & Bayonet using the playtest rules. And 15mm Seven Years War, Warfare in the Age of Reason. I wrote King's War (it is commercially available) and Little Big Battles with the help of my good friend Jeff Cox. The rest are commercially available.

Expect most of my posts to be about writing.

So where are the writing projects as of 8/6/06?
Firestar has been in the hands of one agent since early April, and a second agent since late July. I sent Cross Time Cop to an editor per her request at the end of July.

I am four chapters into A Different World, a second novel about Virginia Stone, the detective who ends up in an 1895 Victorian World where Great Britain still holds suzerainty over North America. Virginia, Gina to her friends, lives in the province of South Columbia, and works as a police officer (a Matron) in the town of New Essex. New Essex is on Puget Sound, about where the town of Fife is in our world. It is a rapidly growing port city of a little over 20,000 people, and the second largest city in South Columbia (behind the capitol city of Vancouver, where present day Vancouver Washington is). I will be posting more as I make progress, but right now she is working on two double-murders, a newspaper mogul and the head of a loan shark ring. Both were found shot to death in a seedy hotel in the bad part of town. At the same time she and a friend are investigating the device that lets them travel to alternate histories. She has to fight some of the institutional Victorian attitudes towards women (both from the men and the women) as well as solve the crimes.

I will post updates later, as I write.