UPDATE:

I’m still working hard on my next books and I hope to have them published very soon. The time has really flown by – I can’t believe I haven’t put anything new on Kindle/Amazon since last September, but I’ve been working on several novels and stories at the same time. So I’ve been getting a lot of work done, but I’ve only finished one novel and I have many others in various stages of completion. But the good news is that I should have four to five new books coming out before the end of this year – hopefully more than five.

This is what I’m working on now:

THE DARWIN EFFECT – This book is completed and right now I have it on Kindle Scout with the hopes that Amazon will select it for publication. If not, then I will self-publish within a month or so. This novel is a science fiction thriller with a big twist at the end, but it also has some slight horror elements to it.

There’s still a few more days to nominate my book for publication if you want to, and you can do that here:

https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/2S1HVD7PMYID0

DEVIL’S ISLAND – I’ve been working on this novel for so long now, definitely the one that’s taken me the longest to write so far. But I’m glad I waited, letting the story develop on its own while I worked on other projects. I’m much happier with it now than I was before (but is a writer ever truly satisfied with their work?), and I’m getting close to finishing it now. I hope to have this one available in the next few months.

DARKWIND: ANCIENT ENEMY 2 – I’m very close to the end of this book, a sequel to ANCIENT ENEMY, and I’m very happy with this one. One of the complaints I received over the last few years about ANCIENT ENEMY was the unanswered questions and the abrupt ending. I had originally wrote it as a screenplay (and it had a manager attached to it for a while and a director interested in making the film – but everything fell through like it often does in Hollywood) so it did kind of have that open-ended ending that would allow for a sequel if the first film was successful. But the ending didn’t sit well with some readers. So I promise that the story continues in the sequel and many questions are answered. I hope to have this sequel on Amazon within the next two months and I’m hoping to share the cover for it soon.

I’m also working on another collection of short stories. New stories have just popped up in my mind from time to time, growing and gnawing at me until I have to write them down. I’m going to include some of these new stories along with some older ones, and a few that have been published previously in magazines. I’m also planning to include illustrations for each story with this one.

I’ve begun a post-apocalyptic series and I’m just about done with Book One. I don’t want to say too much about it, but I’m not sure if I’m going to publish it until I have Book 2 ready. I’ve written a sword and sorcery type fantasy with a friend of mine (Tony Circelli, the same friend I wrote DESCENDANTS OF MAGIC with), but I don’t want to put the first book in the trilogy out there until I have the second book written and the third book outlined. Tony is very busy and the second book for Descendants kind of stalled a few years ago. I really want to continue the story, and I’ve learned that readers don’t want to read the first book in a series if there’s no promise of further books to come anytime soon. So, having learned that lesson, I don’t want to put the first book in my post apocalyptic series out there until I’m at least halfway through my second book.

I’m also working on a few other things: I’ve got two novellas I’m working on now that may turn into novels. These will be more suspense than horror, but they’re both stories that I really love. I’m also beginning the outline for an alien invasion story of the very creepy creature kind.

I have other ideas that are just that at this moment – ideas, and sometimes I feel like I’ve got more ideas than time to work on them. But that’s a good thing, right? I just want you to know that I’m working hard on getting these out there to you, and I really want to thank all of you who have read my books and who have left reviews and sent me e-mails and spoken so kindly of my work. You, the readers, have made this dream of being a writer come true, and I am so thankful.

Until next time …

I found this article on a link from William Cook’s awesome Facebook Page (which you can find below) and I wanted to share it with everyone. William has a great and active FB page and everyone should sign up with the group.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/selfpublishingsuccessfully/

This article that I’m sharing from J.A. Konrath (bestselling author of many books) is about the pros and cons of pre-orders for your books on Kindle.

Enjoy!

http://jakonrath.blogspot.co.nz/2016/04/do-ebook-preorders-work.html

Until next time …

Here’s the next article in my series of writing tips.

KEEP YOUR IDEAS TO YOURSELF, AT LEAST AT FIRST.

This tip can be a tough one. I believe that at first an idea for a story or a novel can be a fragile thing and it might need to be protected. I like to let an idea roll around in my head for a while, or put it on the back burner in my mind to cook. I believe while the idea is “cooking” or “growing” or “developing” or whatever metaphor you want to use, you should keep this idea to yourself as it grows. You could jot down some notes, possibly a quick character outline, or even a simple outline of the story itself, but I believe you should still keep the idea close for a while.

I’ve broken this rule a lot over the years. My favorite sounding board to bounce ideas off of is my wife. And sometimes, especially when an idea hasn’t grown yet or become fully-formed, I will tell her about it. And then as I start describing the idea to her, it begins to sound a little stupid (sometimes – not always). And then I’ll say to her: “Wow, that idea sounded a lot better in my mind.”

I’ve heard other writers say that an idea can be talked to death while it’s still in the growing stage; the magic of the idea can be lost if it’s talked about too much. You may get a bad reaction from someone you’re telling the idea to, and then you may abandon an idea before really giving it a chance.

Now I’m going to contradict myself.

Once the idea is fully-formed or has come to a full boil on your mental stovetop, it may be time to talk it out with someone. Again, I turn to my wife (she loves it, I swear!). If you’re lucky enough to have someone to bounce ideas off of, you might want to do that at this stage.

Ultimately it’s up to you as a writer if you ever want to talk an idea out or not before you begin your first draft. Like I said above, I talk some of my ideas out with my wife, or my sister, or other members of my family, and it really seems to help. Sometimes if I’m stuck on a spot in the story, just talking it out can help lead to a solution. Of course trying to write through a spot you’re stuck on in your story should be your first choice, but talking it out has helped me many times in the past.

Just one word of caution though. You might talk your idea out with someone and they may not like your idea. That’s okay … it’s their opinion. But if you still can’t get the idea out of your head even after a negative reaction, you can’t stop turning the idea around over and over in your mind, then you may still want to run with it. I’ve had ideas that I wasn’t sure about at first, but I kept them on the back burner in my mind, returning to them every once in a while, changing things here and there, until everything just started to click into place. And soon the story in this particular pot was boiling over and I couldn’t wait to start writing.

Talking your idea out with someone when it’s at the right stage can really help.

I hope this tip helps someone out there, and please feel free to share your own writing tips, or anything else you want to share.

Until next time …

 

 

 

I just wanted to share an article I found on Nat Russo’s blog about the myths of social media for writers.

Here’s the link:

Hope this helps!

Until next time …

Where do you get your ideas?

I guess this is a question writers get a lot so I wanted to tackle it here. Whenever science fiction writer Harlan Ellison was asked where he got his ideas from, he would answer: Schenectady, New York.

So where do I get my ideas from? Answer: I don’t really know. But I’ll try to explain below.

I wish I could explain the idea-getting process a little better, but it just seems like ideas kind of pop up in my mind. Once an idea is there, I just kind of let it grow a little, letting it develop more, seeing where it leads. If the idea is intriguing enough, I’ll jot down a few notes on paper so I don’t lose the basic plot of the story, but I’ll keep the idea mostly in my mind until it grows enough to where I feel like I need to start writing more notes or even an outline.

Here are some of the places I’ve gotten ideas from in the past: magazine articles, an interview on the radio (NPR), watching bad movies (sometimes you get better ideas watching a bad movie than a good movie because you can imagine what you would’ve done with that same story plot), reading short stories, talking with family or friends, news articles.

Another way ideas come to me is just through the act of writing. I know I might have said it before, but just the act of writing (whether with pen and paper or on the computer) can open up the floodgates of ideas or draw back the theatrical curtains to the mind’s eye. I don’t really know how to explain it, but it’s like when I’m concentrating on that scene in a story, the one I’m writing at that moment, my subconscious mind begins to wander and ideas form.

I’ve also had some of my best ideas while doing trivial things that allow my mind to wander: driving (I’m a safe driver, I swear), mowing the lawn, working out, etc.

I think it helps to do a lot of reading, learning, and exploring to generate ideas. Even if you write only in a certain genre, I believe it’s helpful to learn about anything else that might interest you. You never know when some detail you’ve learned somewhere else might turn up in your story, perhaps in a character’s past or in a location, or other areas. These little details can add a lot of flavor to your writing.

Trying to force ideas may be a bad idea. I’ve always wanted to write a vampire novel, but any ideas that really excite me haven’t come along yet, and I don’t want to force an idea into a story if I’m not excited about it. I’ll just have to wait until the next time I’m mowing the lawn or driving and an idea pops into my mind.

I wish I had a better answer for where my ideas come from, or where they come from in general. All I can say is sometimes you have to let the mind wander and just try writing a few pages and maybe those ideas will form.

I will be writing another article about ideas soon. Hope this helps someone out there, and please feel free to comment – I would love to hear from you.

Until next time …

 

I came across this interesting article about writing on Twitter and I wanted to share the link. Although this article is aimed more at screenwriters, I still think there’s valuable advice for any writer. In the article there are a lot of links to other great articles.

Here’s the link:

http://www.scriptmag.com/features/ask-script-qa/5-wrong-writing-beliefs-will-hold-back-2016

Hope you enjoy the article and I’ll be writing another one very soon!