About
J.P. Colman writes things. Most of them are too long. Some are nice and short. He lives in Canada, enjoys furry creatures, and doomscrolls far too much of his life away.
Books
Market Based Solutions
Market Based Solutions or: A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Operation Iraqi Freedom is a military thriller with a sense of humour. Inspired by equal parts Sorkinese political banter and video game classics like Metal Gear Solid, it follows mercenary Cris Fehr as he enters a dangerous geopolitical game in Central Asia.
Behold the cover and blurb:
Cris Fehr isn’t your typical mercenary. He only works for the underdogs and the downtrodden, taking the jobs too risky and too poorly financed for anyone else. He’s got a reputation of fighting for things other than money, and it’s well earned.
He’s also just found his dream job.
Out in the Central Asian steppe, a rogue weapons development facility has fallen into the hands of armed extremists, and the United States Government wants Fehr to find out what’s inside. There’s only one catch: he’d be working for a man he swore he’d never serve under again.
Compromising his ideals this one time, he takes his team of highly trained experts and descends into a lethal web of geopolitics and heavily armed opponents. As he enters the dark heart of the facility, each step reveals more secrets and more danger. But nothing could prepare him for what waits at the very bottom…
Kaiserreich: Prelude to the Second Weltkrieg
What if Germany won World War One? And what if World War Two was right around the corner? In this collection of alternate history short stories based on the popular computer game Hearts of Iron, readers will explore a portrait of history’s awesome power to shape our everyday world, even if it’s not the world we know.
As a derivative fan work (based in large part upon the fan works of hundreds of others), these stories will always be available for free online. They can currently be found on Archive of Our Own.
In addition, the collection will soon be available in ebook and paperback format. Lo, the cover art and full blurb:
On February 3, 1936 the Berlin stock market collapsed. The centre of global trade and the seat of the world’s most powerful empire fell into economic ruin, dooming millions to poverty and setting in motion the terrifying gears of war. One year on from that dark day, nations around the world are still reeling from the impacts of this financial downfall, and the terrible gears have continued to turn. With the world inching ever closer to a second global war, every nation faces an uncertain future, and every person a nearly impossible challenge: to plan their lives in the face of that future.
In this alternate history, based on a popular modification for the best-selling Hearts of Iron computer game series, the United States never entered World War 1, and Germany wound up winning the war, known forever after as the Weltkrieg. Yet even in this timeline, the same forces of nationalism, imperialism, colonialism, ideology, and economic suffering that helped give rise to our World War Two threatens to birth another Weltkrieg. A tour of the world one year on from the collapse of the German economy, this collection of short stories sets the stage for the conflict to come: they are the prelude to the Second Weltkrieg.
Karl Schreiber, a university student called home for the funeral of his grandfather; Zheng Hui, a peasant farmer seeing off her husband for a trip to the nearest village; Mary Hernandez, a woman just trying to keep clothes on her back and food in her stomach; Ilya Mikhailov, a political operative pursuing his dream and looking out for his family – on their own each character lives a relatively normal life that threatens to be turned upside down by powers beyond their control. Put together they paint a portrait of history’s awesome power to shape our everyday world, even if it’s not the world we know.
Mailing List & Contact
If you are so inclined, you can sign-up to receive updates about future projects and sneak previews of upcoming works. You can even reply to the emails and tell me what you really think. Alternatively, feel free to berate on Twitter or follow on Goodreads.