All posts by Machine Trooper

Marketing, Non-Fiction/Documentary

A Tale of Two Blurbs

Leave a comment

Getting another promotion together for the first book in the Paradox Series. Hope to get some reviews, increase visibility, get readers to invest in the series–all the usual stuff.  Anyway, the outfit I’m working with rewrote my blurb, as part of their services.

To be honest, the existing blurb could be better. I didn’t slip in the time machine as smoothly as I should have, for instance:

Pete Bedauern began his life as a latchkey kid in a run-down trailer park with a single mom, living on stale hot dog buns and bleak prospects. Those were the cards Fate had dealt him, and Pete was on his way to becoming an angry young man. Then Pete’s estranged uncle burst on the scene to punch Fate in the mouth.

Uncle Si is scarred inside and out; he’s a hard drinker; painfully blunt; a little mysterious and maybe even scary, but takes an interest in his nephew that Pete’s father never took. Most of Uncle Si’s life is a secret, but through the part of it he shares, Pete undergoes a master course on life, love, and full-contact sports.

As it turns out, Uncle Si not only has tons of money, multiple businesses, and a fleet of fast cars–he also owns a time machine.

Paradox is one good-hearted-but-alienated boy’s odyssey into manhood, and Escaping Fate is the opening leg of that journey. Before it’s complete, Pete will learn the guarded secrets of history, take on a pan-continuum conspiracy, contend for a world championship, crack the code for success with women…and even save the world.

Well, one world, maybe…

And here’s the rewrite:

Plunge into the gritty reality of Pete Bedauern, a boy marooned in the desolation of a decrepit trailer park, his life a monotonous echo of neglect under the care of a beleaguered single mother. 

His days, a blend of stale sustenance and dwindling hopes, seem destined to mold him into a resentful youth. But destiny takes an unexpected turn with the explosive arrival of Uncle Si, a figure as enigmatic as he is transformative.

Uncle Si, marked by life’s brutal trials with scars both visible and hidden, emerges as an unlikely mentor. He is unapologetically raw, a man who’s tasted life’s extremes, from the depths of pain to the peaks of success. Beneath his gruff exterior and shrouded past, he harbors a profound interest in Pete, offering the paternal attention Pete has long been starved of. Through Uncle Si’s guidance, Pete embarks on a profound journey, a masterclass in the nuances of life, the complexities of love, and the adrenaline of full-contact sports.

But Uncle Si is more than just a mentor with worldly possessions and wisdom. He possesses a staggering secret – a time machine. As Pete steps into the realm of the impossible, he is catapulted into a thrilling odyssey. “Paradox” is not just a journey through time; it is Pete’s voyage into the heart of manhood. Along this electrifying path, he unravels history’s hidden truths, confronts a sinister pan-continuum conspiracy, vies for a world championship, and deciphers the elusive art of winning hearts.

As Pete navigates this labyrinth of adventures, he stands on the precipice of not just changing his own fate, but the destiny of an entire world. 

This is more than a story of growth; it’s an exhilarating ride through time and transformation, where a boy emerges not just as a man, but as a savior of worlds – at least one, perhaps more.

Me personally, I don’t see this as much of an improvement. Seems like they just jammed in as many SEO keywords, adjectives an “strong action verbs” as possible, without even knowing what happens in the book. In fact, I wonder if they used AI to come up with this.

“Plunge into the gritty reality of…”

“He possesses a staggering secret…”

“…labyrinth of adventures…”

Holy purple prose, Batman.

“…the nuances of life, the complexities of love, and the adrenaline of full-contact sports.”

Is that really better than simply “life, love, and full contact sports”?

Seems like change for the sake of change. When you look at something objectively, there is prose that works and prose that doesn’t work. The assumption here is apparently that absolutely nothing in the existing blurb works…that every single sentence needs to be cram-packed with adjectives and over-the-top verbs.

I don’t buy it.

Does this writing style really sell books?

With some changes, they’re trying to cast a wider net and attract every kind of reader. Note how they changed this line to avoid offending feminists, white knights and manginas:

My words: “…crack the code for success with women…”

Their words: “…deciphers the elusive art of winning hearts.”

But, see, my books are not for every kind of reader–especially feminists, white knights and manginas. This version of the blurb may not offend them, but what’s in the book still will. I learned from experience to intentionally put trigger words/phrases in product descriptions to scare the woketard Thought Police away. These folks are trying to undo that. And frankly, their version sounds lame.

“…beleaguered single mother”? Beleaguered by who or what? Why do they say that? I’ll tell you why: once again, they’re trying to avoid offending the Karens in our gynocentric culture. “See here, Henry! Single mothers are heroes and victims! In the problematic way you wrote it, you leave room for people to assume that being raised by a single mother might be less than ideal. You have to make it clear that any shortcomings of a mother raising a child in that scenario must obviously be somebody else’s fault!”

Maybe I should go ahead and run it close to how they wrote it, and see if it has an effect on sales. They may not know much about the book they’re trying to describe (in a voice completely unlike the voice of the narrator), but it might be a safe assumption that they know a lot more about SEO than I do.

If I were a reader/shopper, the existing blurb would have a much better chance of piquing my interest than the the version the professionals (or AI) came up with. But I also know not everybody thinks like I do.

Here’s the book in question.

Here’s the link to buy it outside of Amazon.

Fantasy, Reviews

Altar of my Fate by Michael R. Schultheiss – a Review

Leave a comment

By THE INFAMOUS REVIEWER GIO:

 

Sometimes a book is good, sometimes is average, a few other times is very poor. But every once in a while you find one that is plainly and utterly GREAT!

The Rosteval Saga book 1: Altar of my Fate is all that and then some! What can I say, this book’s got it all: excellent prose, characters, plot. The author was able to really capture the spirit of the ‘ancient warrior’ with a dash of fantasy lore. The result is a true epic, a ‘classic’ in my opinion. 

Too many times we’ve seen modern writers not being able to distance themselves from the world we live in to produce an epic that feels authentic. Schultheiss here was able to create not only an ancient world that feels tangible but an entire English language disconnected from modern urban English.

The pace is fast when it needs to be but also slower when characters or locations need to be further explored.

Now, this story might not be for the squeamish due to some violence and other subjects considered ‘taboo’ in modern society. But if you yearn for true ‘escapism’ and want to visit ancient exotic lands and witness men become demigods, this is a MUST READ!

 

*Note: the only issue I have with this book is the cover! That cover does the story no justice and it’s a disservice to the true spirit of this epic classic. Maybe I’m nitpicking but I just had to call it out!

 

Stay tuned for review of Book 2 coming soon!

Action, Reviews

Catskinner’s Book by Misha Burnett – a Review

Leave a comment

By THE INFAMOUS REVIEWER GIO:

 

“Yeah, it’s a trap, and we know it’s a trap, and they know that we know, and so on and so forth. We go anyway, or we run away. I’m tired of running.”

James Ozwryck 

 

Imagine a quirky, dark humored, action/sci-fi movie directed by David Fincher and starring Edward Norton and perhaps Margot Robbie as co-star….THAT is what Catskinner’s Book felt to me the whole time I was reading! 

Of course, if you ask author Misha Burnett, he will tell you that the concept of this story is based in part on himself as he was diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder, and part of his motivation for writing this was an attempt to convey what D.I.D. feels like from inside.

The other main inspiration for this quite unique and peculiar tale was William S. Burrough, specifically his Nova Express trilogy. 

This story is about James Ozwryck, a seemingly ordinary store clerk who believes he has an entity or alien form residing within him which he calls ‘Catskinner’. James and Catskinner communicate and even ‘argue’ at times, but the interesting thing is that when catskinner takes over James’ body he can find himself achieving physical feats otherwise impossible for a guy his size. As far as James can remember, Catskinner has always been with him since birth.

The entirety of Book 1 revolves around James finding out more and more about Catskinner and its origins, and to be honest, I was HOOKED! The story has good pace, good prose style that brilliantly reflects the urban language of our times, some jaw-dropping action scenes, violence and a dry sense of humor that-in this context-is very spot on.

If you were wondering what the book cover was about, that cover is from a photo shoot of Burnett’s roommate and those are the author’s hands you see. What the image reflects is the main character James wanting to care for and protect Godiva, the co-main character.

Now that I highlighted some of the positive aspects of this book, let’s turn our attention to some of the negatives which lead me to score this more like a 4 out of 5 stars…

 

The Closing Act:

As I always advise authors, no matter how many sequels in one particular series you plan to write, you still have to offer a ‘complete experience’ to your readers in each individual book. Unfortunately, I feel like this book fails to accomplish that. The conclusion felt rushed, hollow, and disappointing. We basically end up where we started from and we realize we have learned close to zero about what we were seeking along with the main character. The end is abrupt, almost like the writer didn’t know what else to do and decided to just end it there. I am all for cliffhangers and creating expectations to read the next book, but at the same time, each book must deliver some sense of fulfillment or that at least we have moved on from point A to point B… I just did not see that here, although the entire ride was extremely fun and suspenseful. Actually that in itself made the end that much more disappointing for me personally.

Adventure, Fantasy, Military

The Alchemy for Art Indie Library

Leave a comment

The deck is really stacked against indie (independent) authors. It’s even worse for non-woke indie authors. You get no help with marketing from a publisher. Chances are slim your titles will ever be discovered in a brick-and-mortar bookstore. Your name isn’t associated with the prestige of the legacy publishing houses (dwindling, though it may be). Alternative media doesn’t care that you exist  and in most cases won’t plug your work to their audience. (Some of the alternate media outlets are controlled opposition and only promote ticket-takers, if they promote anyone at all.) The goose-stepping cultural Marxists who control the MSM and social media will get you censored/deplatformed/demonetized if they can, but if you succeed anyway, they will assassinate your character in the typical ways (“racist!” “conspiracy theorist!” etc.).

Thankfully, there are some folks who understand that indies should be taken seriously,* and through selfless effort, are trying to make their books more visible. Virtual Pulp (and the Two-Fisted Blog, before it) has always been a site that gave indies exposure, and now gets contributions from THE INFAMOUS REVIEWER GIO to amplify that effort. Writer Katie Roome also specializes in reviewing indie fiction at Periapsis Press. And then there is author Mark Bradford, who has built an attractive online aggregation of indie books.

Alchemy for Art (https://alchemyfor.art/books/) is growing, and I assume it will continue to grow. As of this moment, it boasts 12 authors and 33 books. The books are grouped by author, and by genre. Fantasy is the most represented genre so far, with sci-fi coming in second. But other genres are represented, including some that I write in.

My theory is that as more books are added to the list, the more readers will want to peruse it. So it looks like a win-win endeavor.

In other words, both readers and writers should visit the library. Authors should get their books added, and readers should check back regularly to see what books have been added.

 

* Indie books are much like tradpub books, in that quality varies. There are plenty from both sources that are terrible. The advantage of the indie end of the spectrum is that is where you’ll find the non-ticket-taking, non-woke authors. And because the gatekeepers have no direct control, that is where you’ll find  most of the superb storytelling in the book biz today, IMO.

Politics/Current Events, Reviews, TEOTWAWKI

The Creator – Predictive Programming?

Leave a comment

Did some major travelling over Christmas break, and saw some movies I hadn’t heard of and might never have watched otherwise. One of them was this sci-fi dystopian thriller.

You might have heard the term “predictive programming” in recent years. It’s a psyop strategy discussed by “conspiracy theorists.” There seem to be multiple explanations of what it is. One of them assumes that those in control of government, media, entertainment and all other institutions are somehow obligated or compelled to warn us peasants about what they plan to do to us in the future. They like doing this via entertainment, then snicker to each other about how stupid and gullible we are for failing to understand (and/or failing to resist).

I will analyze this movie using that explanation of predictive programming.

We have a future scenario which might remind you of the Terminator movies in that A.I. has become like Skynet. A.I. was taking over the world, and coming to see humans as pests, it nuked Los Angeles.

So the American  military (which, evidently, is entirely comprised of Delta Force and Seal Team 6, judging by the shaggy hair, face armor, and optional adherence to uniformity) is tasked with destroying A.I.–which is based in China. The US has built a gargantuan hovering weapons platform called NOMAD which can locate and target A.I. assets, and is invincible, up until it’s time for the plot climax.

There are a lot of nits to pick, but I’m gonna try to stick to the metaphorical message of the narrative, here.

Spoilers are unavoidable, so let me  give you the big plot twist first: A.I. didn’t nuke anybody. Los Angeles was a 9/11ish false flag. A.I. is not trying to wipe out humanity. A.I. is benevolent and has “more heart” than humanity. At least humans in America.

America is the root of all evil. Pretty standard worldview of anybody allowed to work in Homowood, Commiefornia, of course. Willfully blind to nuance, they make no distinction between the America that once existed and the Orwellian corporatist abomination that has replaced it in real life.

The important points:

With only one exception, Caucasians are all villains, or at best, part of the problem.

The only good guys are non-white.

America holds the world hostage, terrorizing people with its frightening technology–in order to eliminate other frightening technology.

The Chinese and robot victims of the American Bullies are just like the Viet Cong: wonderful people living in harmony who dindu nuffin until provoked by Yankee imperialists.

NOMAD is basically the USA itself–a huge, heartless machine using murder and intimidation to colonize the less fortunate and build empire. Maybe the similarity of “NOMAD” to “NORAD” is not coincidental. (Marxists love to conflate, and this would conflate America with the military-industrial complex and the globalist agents who have hijacked America.)

A.I. is a benevolent supervisor of humanity. It only wants the best for us. It’s like a protective parent or older sibling. You could call it “Big Brother,” I suppose.

Big Brother is trying to rescue the world from the diabolical running dog Americans who foolishly resist the Singularity. As part of this effort, A.I. has manufactured a child Messiah (complete with miraculous powers) who wants to set everyone “free.”

The Messiah Child is said to be developing a weapon that can destroy NOMAD. Not true, evidently, but the fear of such is used to justify an American military operation (shades of WMDs in Iraq, obviously) to  destroy the Messiah Child.

In some convoluted twist of movie logic, the Messiah Child is somehow the offspring of the black hero’s Asian wife. Big Brother used the woman’s genes to manufacture the robot, or enhance its CPU or something. Anyway, this Messiah has a Current Year Diverse Mary and Joseph as parental figures.

The hero turns coat (his commanding officer labels him a traitor) and becomes the Messiah Child’s protector. They get aboard NOMAD and plant an explosive device.

The child escapes.

The hero finally reunites with his wife; they embrace and kiss as chain reaction explosions consume them and everything around them.

NOMAD is destroyed and falls from the heavens to crash and burn on Earth. The world celebrates.

To put it in more simple terms:

  • America is a hated terrorist country.
  • Big Brother (headquartered in China, apparently) begins to take over the world. For our own good, of course.
  • Big Brother even produces a lovable Messiah figure to set robots free.
  • Most humans outside the US have been replaced by bots.
  • The bots are more altruistic than humans–especially Americans.
  • The reactionary USA sees all this as a threat.
  • America goes to war with Big Brother.
  • There are foreign nations living within the USA fulfilling key roles–including in our military and espionage agencies.
  • Those (non-white) nations will decide that Big Brother is more righteous than the USA, and switch allegiance when the chips are down.
  • POC, anchor babies and A.I. technology will sabotage America from within, bringing down the USA in spectacular fashion while it is engaged in an unjust foreign conflict.
  • Big Brother and its manufactured Messiah will escape destruction.
  • The POC/Trojan Horse nations within the USA will enjoy carnal pleasure right up until their evil American hosts are consumed in apocalyptic fire.
  • The “good” humans of the world will now be joyous and free of American oppression. Ding-dong, the Yanks are dead.
  • Now the world can live in harmony under the compassionate guidance of Big Brother.

The long-form message is  also in perfect alignment with the power behind Homowood. As members of the Hive Mind so often do, they use the catastrophes caused by its own mechanisms (in this case, the Globohomo Cabal controlling the US government–and its foreign policy in particular) as an argument for embracing more of its own mechanisms (in this case a global government under an A.I. Big Brother that will sweep away the last vestiges of the Old [American] Republic).

Fantasy, Interview, Marketing, Non-Fiction/Documentary

An Interview with Ernie Laurence, Jr.

Leave a comment

Virtual Pulp is pleased to once again host THE INFAMOUS REVIEWER GIO as he interviews the author of the Islands of LOAR: Sundered.

Gio: Book 1 came out over a decade ago, what exactly drove you to write it and then have it published? Looking back now, would you make any changes or have done anything different?

 

Ernie Laurence: The Islands of Loar series is the last series I wrote.  I have written over 40 novels-worth of stories, but never went through any editing or publishing.  When I married back in 2005, my wife found out and encouraged me to publish.  So, I began the long process of actually learning the craft.  I took several classes, mostly technical writing classes, and learned about editing and eventually publishing.  Since Loar was the last, I felt the most confident (and the least emotionally attached if I didn’t do well) publishing that series first.  I referred to Sundered as “my Isaac”, a child to be sacrificed on the altar of public opinion, so to speak.


I had been telling stories for a long time and they were always well received.  I am a forever GM when it comes to tabletop gaming and some of those elements have made it into my books, though I have expanded the stories well beyond that.  When I started down the road to publishing and let people know, I received a lot of encouragement from those close to me.  The initial versions were well received with some helpful criticism.  Thean, for example, came across as kind of flat to a lot of people and several told me to tighten the story by dumping him.  However, I knew he had a purpose and so I went back in and thickened his story a lot.  I’m glad I did that.

The only difference I would make, and actually have made, is to bring the book more in-line with what I’m doing with the tabletop gaming system I’ve been working on for 7 years now.  The other books grew more aligned with it as I began to develop it.  A couple of years ago, I went back and made some tweaks so that would be the case for all of them.  An example is that I changed Spenciel’s “class” from monk to kaisoma.  And I’m really proud of that word. Heh.

 

Gio: The first thing that strikes me as I read Sundered is the introduction of a multitude of characters, and not just minor characters but major players. Was that a conscious decision, to add so many characters as the story unfolds?

 

Ernie Laurence: Yes.  I read a lot.  I’m somewhere over 4000 books now.  And the ones that I really enjoyed were those with a rich cast – the Wheel of Time for instance.  In fact, I wrote the Islands of Loar right after Crossroads of Twilight published in January of 2003.  I read an article at one point that said, “write each character as if they were the main character” and it used Han Solo as the example.  Han wasn’t just the shuttle pilot for Luke, Ben, and the droids.  He had his own backstory, motivations, goals, and rich personality.

So every character in Loar is like that.  Even the minor ones have their own story.  As I have time, I fill in those tidbits on my wiki for readers to get more depth as they like.

Loar is a story about people in desperate straits.  The only way they are going to survive is together.  I needed a large cast to emphasize this point.  It wouldn’t just be one hero with extraordinary powers in just the right circumstances.  It would be an entire world of people working together to save themselves from annihilation.  Sundered sets that stage by showing the people as disconnected from each other as the Islands are from the original planet they used to be a part of.

 

Gio: Without giving out any spoilers, what is the ‘Sundering’ and what caused it? I ask because for example in Lord of The Rings we know at all times what the cause of all the troubles in Middle Earth is, but in Loar it seems like this is not as clear (at least not in book 1).

 

Ernie Laurence: The Sundering is the explosion of the planet.  Some force, or maybe several working in conjunction, literally tears the planet apart.  It is only through the elemental magic of the sorcerers that anyone survived at all.  The geomancers hold the twenty largest chunks where people have gathered together.  The aeromancers held the atmosphere over them.  The pyromancers channeled the heat of the explosion around the chunks, and the hydromancers used the specific heat capacity of the ocean to absorb what the pyromancers couldn’t redirect.  Once the cataclysm itself ended, they then worked together to stabilize their world.  I intend on writing more about all this and perhaps even turning the part immediately post-Sundering into a MMORPG where environmental changes the players make working together can become permanent.  It will be a much more cooperative MMORPG than standard titles.


I don’t want to specify what caused the Sundering here because that’s part of what the characters (and readers) have to find out as they move through the series.  There are a lot of hypotheses and the characters of the world think they know early on.  It isn’t revealed until later if they are right, partially right, mostly wrong, or if the Council of Wind is just making things up to control people.

 

Gio: There are a lot of politics involved in Book 1. This makes Sundered much more complex than your typical action/fantasy novel because we have individuals in power who basically play this game of chess with people’s lives. Politics and legislature seems to play a big role in this world. Was that also a conscious decision to go that route, and where did you get this idea of writing these pretty intense political debates from?

 

Ernie Laurence: A large part of the hook of the story is for the reader to figure out who the bad guys really are.  The politics are an integral part of the story because it sets the saviors of the world up as the initial antagonists.  They are a council of monarchs, tyrants with near absolute power who control the atmosphere around the Islands.  If you do not obey, they simply remove the air from around you and you die.  They can do this for their entire Island so there is no opportunity for rebellion.  This is in large part because the geomancers and pyromancers are gone.  The hydromancers, for whatever reason, have been relegated to river rats scraping a living out of meager fares carting people around on boats.

This intense political atmosphere drives against the work of the protagonists for a large part of the story as things get worse and worse through the series.  Ultimately, I set up a counter-plot to it, but that’s not in Sundered so I’ll say no more.  The politics and economics, though, are reflective of that overarching thought: Loar won’t survive if they are divided and the political actions of the aeromancers are dividing the people more and more.  Sadly, most of them are just too tired, too downtrodden by living on a broken world to fight back.  They need some jolt to wake them from their stupor, some shining light to guide them out of the darkness.  There’s even a chapter called “Boiling the Batrachos” (Chapter 39) where the Dhorens are introduced.  Its purpose is to show that the few people who are speaking out against the tyranny, the bards, are being systematically rounded up and silenced and no one is stepping up to defend them.  Batrachos means “frog” so it’s a familiar analogy for most readers.  The society has been on a slow-burn fall into tyranny and they are just accepting it so long as they have air and food.

There are certainly parallels with our own world, at least in the most general sense.  I don’t have specific political groups or individual politicians in mind when I write the aeromancers.  They are their own characters.  But the idea of tyranny versus liberty and America’s slow slide into the former certainly has a strong influence on my thinking and how I crafted the political climate of Loar.

 

Gio: Going back to the multitude of characters we encounter, it seems like there is no one main character here, but readers might find a personal favorite character as they further explore this world. In your mind, who is truly the main character or protagonist here?

 

Ernie Laurence: One of the conscious decisions I made when starting out on this world was that this story was bigger than one person, one hero.  The main protagonist is all the heroes working together and those who join them later (yes, the cast definitely grows).  There are three “main” threads in Sundered, each with its own cast.  Doogan’s group, Spenciel’s group, and Thean’s group.  In Sundered, they begin to cross paths as I set up the main conflict over the four book arc.  In book two, “The” protagonist, the group, starts coming together as choices and circumstances make that necessary.  In terms such as you are asking about, it is more helpful to think of the protagonist as the group and the antagonist as a question mark.

 

Gio: we’re now on Book 4. What do you have in the works for the immediate future and what can we expect to see regarding Islands of Loar? Are you planning to focus more on the novels or tabletop games?

 

Ernie Laurence: I have a lot of pots on the stove, so to speak. My main project right now is to finish the art for the Player’s Handbook for the tabletop system.  We already have an introductory module out for sale so it’s important to get the core rules out soon.  Yet, as far as novels go, I am going to polish a novella I wrote called “Steel” for publishing.  I’m also working on bringing my very first novel up to date maturity-wise, polish it and then publish.  This is the first book I wrote that turned out to be more than 350,000 words.  So it will be broken into a trilogy.  Right now it’s just called “Demon War”, but that will be the trilogy(?) and each book in the series will get its own name.

Plans to revisit Loar in the future are laid out.  There are unwritten novels from different time periods that I want to write.  The arrival of humans pre-Sundering, the Godswar that leads up to the Sundering itself, something immediately following the Sundering (maybe a video game), the War of Wind and Fire, and then another related series that I don’t want to say anything about as of yet.  There is a hint about it in Book 4 of this series that you are reading.

There are a lot of novels written already though that need polish and publishing so I will likely go back and forth between those and new works as well as continually writing modules and the other core rulebooks like the Creature Codex, the Game Master Guide, Manual of Mysticism, Economic Encyclopedia, and so on.

Fantasy, Reviews

ISLANDS OF LOAR: Sundered – a Review

1 Comment

By THE INFAMOUS REVIEWER GIO:

 

When I first picked up this title, naturally I assumed it was probably going to be another Tolkienian type of tale, perhaps with a dash of Dragonlance mixed in it.

Boy was I wrong! To my big surprise, other than featuring fantastic creatures like elves, dwarves, and orcs (and many many more!) this story stands out for its originality and brilliance of execution.

By the time we wrap up chapter 4 we are made aware that this is an ambitious project with massive scope. Why? Well, for instance, Chapters 1 through 4 introduce us to three or four separate casts of both major and minor players in this saga. This is not the type of story you can just skimp through. The sheer number of characters and locations demands our focus. And  these are not shallow types of characters either. They have depth and a wide range of peculiarities that defines them.

The language is precise and to the point. Prose is straightforward and gets the job done without any awkward word selections or expressions that feel out of place. 

What really got me sucked into the story and emotionally invested in these characters is the fact that (this being a magic world, with magic used quite heavily all the time) the danger is real and people get hurt… or worse! Nobody is safe! This is a big puzzle that slowly unfolds before our eyes as we read on. Something truly catastrophic has impacted the world and all species and races–whether they be elves, orcs, dwarves, fairies or centurions–ALL have been affected. This is what is called ‘The Sundering’. What caused the Sundering? And why? Keep reading my friends for this goes from good to better!

Book 1 really hit its target, and that is to bring forward a new and original fantasy saga with good story and complex characters…Honestly, after reading this I immediately picked up book 2 because it is so engaging and exciting to see it all unfold.

Stay tuned for an upcoming Q&A with the author!

Espionage, Reviews, Socio-Sexual Studies

The Hidden Truth–a Review

Leave a comment

Author Hans G. Schantz and I run in some of the same circles, so we’ve bumped into each other before (he also organizes the Big Based Book Sales). But this book was recommended to me by somebody I know online who is not an author. I’ve become so gunshy about all the poorly written indie novels on the market that it took this little nudge for me to give The Hidden Truth a try. I am now thankful for the recommendation.

It doesn’t hurt that the subject matter is right up my alley. I’ve long been fascinated by hidden truths (behind myths, legends, history, common knowledge…but I repeat myself), so the title alone should have been enough.

For my money, the story lives up to the title. Of course, I hope the succeeding books dig deeper into the plot groundwork laid here.

Peter Burdell finds a strange reference while perusing an old book on electricity (I think it’s actually called “wave theory). The information has been censored from other editions of the book. Why? Naturally, our hero is curious, though at first this could all be chalked up to coincidence or inconsistent editing/revisions back in the Dark Ages before the Internet, personal computing, or even television. But when other people stumble across this hidden truth, they die under mysterious circumstances.

Peter is hooked, and just has to dig deeper. As a reader, I’m hooked, too. Again, I’m a sucker for hidden truths–like the missing song in Shadow Hand Blues. or “Rosebud” in Citizen Kane or “Calima” in Planet of the Apes.

I like the characters and never had trouble relating or sympathizing. There was a bit of mustache-twirling by Uncle Larry when he tries to recruit Peter, but overall the storytelling is strong enough that I won’t give this any less than five stars.

The author even dabbles in the socio-sexual hierarchy and the concept of game–and does so in an amusing way.

Seriously, this has been the most enjoyable book I’ve read in years. Strongly recommended.

Reviews

Coming Soon: Robert Victor Mills’ Man of Swords

Leave a comment

Just a heads-up that Gio will soon be reviewing RV Mills’ first Legends of the Wandered Lands book: Man of Swords. Sounds like there may be a follow-up interview forthcoming, as well.

The Wandered Lands. The crucible where legends are forged...

Atop a sacred mountain a young man discovers himself doomed with the cruellest of curses, ever to wander, never to find rest. So begin his adventures through realms of dark peril peopled with men and monsters both, his purpose unknown to all, save perhaps the Gods themselves.

Man of Swords chronicles the first six adventures of the mighty hero Rhoye of Khetaine, wanderer, wildlander, sellsword, as his legend begins. Contains six thrilling tales of dark heroic fantasy, including:
  • The Eye and the Dragon, where the young hero faces his first trial in the Cave of Rite.
  • The Knight Who Would Not Kneel, where Rhoye becomes unwillingly sworn to a dying king desperate to rescue his realm from monsters.
  • The Devil Out the Wych Elm, where Rhoye is saved from sure death only to face a peril all the greater – what is the strange secret of the old spirit’s tree?
  • The Queen of Scorpions, where Rhoye grapples savage pirates and priestesses of terrible purpose in a chase across the Wild Main.
  • The Ember Nixie, a drunken misadventure in the gambling underworld of a snowbound northern port.
  • The Beast Beneath Druihmkirk, where the only escape from an ancient walled city is through the sewers, through the belly of the beast beneath.
Across these six thrilling adventures of sword and sorcery, of chance and fate, and of great deeds, Man of Swords charts the rise of the newest hero to join the Legends of the Wandered Lands.
Marketing, Non-Fiction/Documentary

Book News

Leave a comment

Amazon has discounted Rebooting Fate to $2.99. Don’t know how long that will last, but based on experience: probably until the first few people jump on it.

Speaking of Paradox Book 2, it acquired a rating. A whopping 3 star rating. No reviews, just that. This is a 1st for my books. I don’t get a lot of reviews normally, but when I do, at first they tend to be from readers who liked the book in question. In that way, at least, I’ve been fortunate. Hell and Gone only had 4 & 5 star reviews for years before suffering the first drive-by 1-star.  “Ratings” have made it even easier for drive-by book-bombing. There’s a lot I’m tempted to say about ratings/reviews, but whatever. (UPDATE: While getting links, I saw that a second rating had finally come in–a 5 star, which pulls the average up to 4.)

The bottom line is, Paradox was written as one Tolstoy-length saga, not a series. But to sell it in today’s market, I broke it into a series. It was not meant to be episodic, originally. And though I did what I could to make it work better as an episodic tale, I knew there were going to be problems.  It’s not surprising that a reader would feel they only got part of the story–because any one of these books really is, in fact, just part of the overall story.

And along those lines, I’m mulling over an idea to possibly make the integrated, comprehensive saga available as a hardback and an E-book “box set.” I’ve never done that before, but I think it would be a good fit for this project.

Both of the Paradox books released so far were bestsellers. In fact, both became the #1 Hot New Release. Pleasant surprise, seeing as how I didn’t discount the 2nd one as deeply, nor promote it very hard. And it clung to that #1 Hot New Release spot for almost a week–even after I changed it back to normal price. So yay.

But it sure looks odd when a bestseller only has single-digit ratings/reviews on ‘Zon.  What can ya do?

Paradox Book 3 is scheduled to release in early February. It looks like the paperback will be available not too long after.  Pete/Ike is in college for Defying Fate. There’s a lot of football. As his mind matures, he also becomes aware of parts of life that never interested him as a kid (like politics). Though Uncle Si gave him a good head start, he still has much to learn about friendship, leadership, and women. Not all that learning is painless. He also gets into some sticky wickets that could not happen without a time machine.

It might do better than the previous books for those reasons. It might do better because there’s a nubile blonde on the cover:

Or it might not do better at all. I do plan to lower the price and run a promotion, so we’ll see.

There’s other developments regarding books going on. You may have noticed the new contributor, Gio, has begun reviewing and interviewing. He mines some rare nuggets in today’s literary landscape, and is helping others discover them. Personally, I plan to read Robert Victor Mills‘ old-school sword & sorcery books based on Gio’s recommendation.

I need to post my own review of Hans G. Schantz’s The Hidden Truth–a really good conspiracy thriller with a touch of speculative/sci-fi thrown in. Will look to do that, soon.

Right now I’m reading The Babylon Codex, which, being time travel fiction, is technically competition for my latest. I’m enjoying it so far. Not only is it well-written and plotted, but it deals with (and offers an explanation of) a phenomenon very similar to what I call “The Big Spooky” in Paradox.

With all the stuff happening in the world right now, and what looks to be a whole lot of bad news staring us in the face for the immediate future, there is still some good literature being produced. Embrace it!