Posts Tagged ‘reflections’

50,000 Views!!! Plus, An Email Address and An Upcoming Newsletter!!!

Posted: January 9, 2017 in Living and Life, Writing
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Well, here’s something I didn’t think I’d get to until it became apparent in the past couple of months that it was going to happen. Rami Ungar the Writer has reached the 50,000 views milestone! After five months, four months, and seven days, we’ve reached 50K! Followers of Fear, find a partner and do the dance of joy!

I’ve always wanted to do that.

I say this every time I reach a milestone, but I’m incredibly grateful that you guys continue to come back every time I publish a post. For the first two years or so of this blog, there were times where I wouldn’t get views on my blog for several days, and then get a bump of maybe one or two, and then that would be it for a while. Likes and comments were even rarer, and followers came in at a trickle. It made me wonder if I wasting time with a blog, trying to build an audience that way.

But somehow, I persevered. And you guys kept appearing, and a good chunk of you kept coming back. Slowly, views and likes and comments started increasing. There were even times when I’d get spikes into the hundreds or even the thousands! And then the followers started to rise, and I started calling you my Followers of Fear, and none of you seemed to care one way or another on that one, so I kept going with it. And then a couple of months ago I got to the five-thousand likes milestone, and I was like, “Holy crap, I might get another one soon!” And now it’s come to pass.

Thank you, Followers of Fear. I really appreciate the continued patronage and support. I hope you continue to support me for the next fifty-thousand years (hopefully it won’t take another five years to get there) as I work on becoming a great horror novelist.

And on that subject, there are a couple more announcements I’d like to make while I still have your attention.

Firstly, look at your search bar. You’ve probably noticed, but this site is no longer ramiungarthewriter.wordpress.com, but just ramiungarthewriter.com. Yep, I updated my blog into a full website. Why did I do this? Well, beyond the fact that web address is a bit of mouthful and shortening it makes it a bit less of a mouthful, I’m trying a bunch of new strategies and tactics to increase readership both on my blog and with my books. One of those tactics is to upgrade to a full website, which gives me a couple of distinct benefits. One is now I have an official author email address. That’s right, you can now email me! With a lot of successful authors, I’ve noticed that they have more than a few ways to be interactive with their fanbases, so now I have one more.

So if you want to email me about my books, or a blog post or something, you can write me at ramiungar@ramiungarthewriter.com. I don’t know how often I’ll check my mailbox or how quickly I’ll get back to you, but it’s something I’m devoting effort too.

On a related note, I’m also setting up an email newsletter. This, I hope, is where people who are interested will hear first about publications and contests and other things related to my writing career. I have a feeling that people are getting tired of seeing the latest short story being finished or the latest novel review, so I think I’ll put out something separate that focuses on that, and put stuff on the blog related to the intricacies of writing and of horror, as well as the occasional post about my life or my thoughts on certain subjects.

This is all part of my New Year’s Resolution, which is to be better at getting people interested in my stories and in my writing in general. Will it succeed? No idea, but at least I’m sticking with my New Year’s Resolution and keeping things simple by going for an achievable goal with achievable steps. And I’m open to other tactics that could help me accomplish this. Heck, I may even try Goodreads again, if I can get a better handle on how to work that site.

That’s all for now, my Followers of Fear. I’ve kind of rambled a bit in this post, but at least I’ve gotten a chance to talk about the good news and show some of the progress I’ve made since New Year’s. Until next time!

Self-Pub Authors: Backstory isn’t Character

Posted: January 5, 2017 in Journalism, Reflections, Writing
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I’ve just published my first article of the year on the site Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors. This time, it’s Backstory isn’t Character, and is in response to some things I’ve seen recently in various works of fiction. That problem, as you can tell from the title, is writers thinking a backstory is the same as having a character with a fully-rounded personality. Um, no it isn’t. And in this article, I discuss why that is and how to avoid it in fiction you write, so make sure to check it out if you’re interested.

In addition, I highly encourage you to check out Self-Published Authors Helping Other Authors in full. It is a great website to get advice on writing, editing, publishing and marketing effectively as an independent writer, and it is absolutely free. It’s from authors, by authors, and for authors. Check it out and see for yourself what an excellent resource it is.

2016 In Review; 2017 Up Ahead

Posted: January 1, 2017 in Living and Life, Reflections
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Well, I’m doing that thing where authors look at the year before and be hopeful about the year to come. And I have to say, 2016 was not the easiest year to deal with. Even the people who called 2015 shitty say 2016 was worse. Many people we cared about, from celebrities to icons to just ordinary loved ones, died. The world was rocked by a number of incidents, big and small, that showed that hate and prejudice is still alive and well in many countries one would consider tolerant (let alone the openly-intolerant countries). Groups like ISIS, and events like Brexit and the American presidential election left people the world over confused and terrified about the future. Illnesses and conflicts and starvation raged, and people suffered.

And movies that were supposed to be great, like Batman v. Superman, Suicide Squad, and Ghostbusters, either were terrible or didn’t make the money they should’ve (stuff like that bums me out).

Yeah, this year has been tough. But there have been some amazing things, good things, that have happened this year. We have comedians like Trevor Noah and Jon Oliver and Samantha Bee, who are using their platforms to educate people about existing issues and even find ways to do some good. Thousands of refugees from war-torn Syria and other areas have found homes in more stable countries, and have started rebuilding their lives. Celebrities like Jennifer Lawrence and Emma Watson are using their fame to fight for issues like feminism and equal pay. Hollywood is putting out more movies and TV shows that reflect their viewers, including black-ish, Speechless, and the Fast & Furious movies, to name a few, and while there are still missteps here and there, this shows that the makers of our media care about our opinions. And we nearly had our first female president! It didn’t happen, and it would’ve been cool if it did, but it still shows how far this country has come in terms of women’s rights. And the world got Tape Face from America’s Got Talent. I swear, I could watch his video every day, he’s so clever with the visual gags!

But wait, there’s more! This from YouTube and Vine star Thomas Saunders on reasons to smile:

God, that’s a lot of good, isn’t it? I wish he would’ve added Lucifer on that TV show listing though. That show makes my day!

On a more personal level, 2016 actually went pretty well for me. Yeah, all the nasty stuff I mentioned up above bummed me out, but there were many good things this past year. For one, my mother got married to her partner of several years, which was made possible by the 2015 Supreme Court ruling allowing gay marriage nationwide. That was a blast, and something I was glad to see finally pass. My mother and stepmother are so happy together, and I’m glad they get to be together in the eyes of the law as well.

Around that time, I got offered a couple of jobs/internships! One of them was here in Columbus, and it translated into a full position that I’m still working at right now. It’s a great job, where I’m promoting diversity in my organization with an office full of good people, and getting great pay and benefits while I do it.

In addition, my job has allowed me to move out of my dad’s house and into my own apartment, and even to buy new furniture and a new laptop. I’m paying all my bills on time and still have money to save, which is huge for me! And if things continue to go as they are, who knows? I could even get a cat or save up for a dream vacation to the UK and Ireland! I would love for those to happen.

My sciatica has improved! Yes, for those of you who don’t know, I have sciatica, a condition in which a nerve in the back is squished by spinal discs, causing severe pain in one leg and the lower back. I’ve had this since some time around graduation, but over the summer and through fall and beginning of winter, I started doing some new exercises and other stuff to improve my condition. At the time I’m writing this, I feel only mild discomfort, and sometimes not even that. By next summer, I could be completely cured of it!

This got published!

This got published!

But that’s not all. I released a new book, Video Rage, back in June, and it’s finally started to get some reviews! In addition, nearly all of my books have received new reviews this yer, and more people are discovering them every day. Heck, even my coworkers are reading my books! And on the social media side of things, my blog has grown, accruing nearly 900 subscribers, and passing the five-thousand like milestone. And pretty soon, I’ll be passing the fifty-thousand views milestones. One of my posts actually went kind of viral, garnering over nine-hundred views in the first five weeks of being published, and receiving more views since then.

But there’s more! I started the final book in the Reborn City series, and as of the most recent chapter, I’m a sixth of the way through the book! I could have it released sometime next year! I’ve also written several short stories, and I’ve had some great ideas, both for stories and for strategies to make sure more people discover and read my books. I can’t wait to put some of these to work.

Look folks, this has been a tough year. But for everything I’ve said above, and stuff I haven’t said, it’s been a pretty good one too. And while a lot about 2017 looks scary, we can do a lot to make it a great year. It’ll take some work, but we can make 2017 suck less than 2016 did (I can even post about some of my ideas on how to do just that in another post if you guys want), and to achieve all that we ream.

So will I make a thousand followers? Will I publish another novel and some short stories? Will I get an agent or a contract with a publishing company? Will I get a cat or that vacation? Will we cure AIDS, or improve education, or save the environment? Will the new American president be good at his job? I can’t say with any certainty. But it’s what I hope for. And if not, I’ll do all I can to improve that situation.

Happy New Year, my Followers of Fear. May 2017 bless you and leave you with plenty of reason to smile.

Thoughts on Unsympathetic Protagonists

Posted: December 12, 2016 in Reflections, Writing
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Illustration from The Red Shoes.

Illustration from The Red Shoes.

When I was growing up, every protagonist I came across in fiction–comic books and manga, novels, TV shows, movies–were people you automatically liked. They were sympathetic, they had problems you could identify with, or they found themselves in situations and something about them made you want to root for them, even if they were just good guys set up to fight the evils of the world. At that age, I probably couldn’t have imagined a protagonist who wasn’t likable.

As I got older though, I did come across protagonists who, for some reason or another, I just couldn’t like. And I realized, in some cases, that was the intention. Their creators, for whatever reason, wanted these characters to be assholes, or losers, or just so hateful you found yourself cheering a little when they failed. This had me asking: why would you want an unsympathetic protagonist? And can you actually have a good or even a successful story based around one?

I figured out answers to these questions a while back, but I’ve always wanted to blog about them. Now I’ve got the time, so I’d like to go into the strange phenomena that is the unsympathetic protagonist.*

First, why do authors sometimes write unsympathetic protagonists? It seems almost counter-intuitive: why would you want a character whom readers/viewers might hate? Well, one reason is as a moral warning. In the fairy tale The Red Shoes, the protagonist is vain and selfish, and her attitude leads her shoes being enchanted so that when she dances in them, she can’t stop until someone chops them off. I bet a lot of kids got the message loud and clear from that! Another example is from the novel The Coldest Winter Ever by Sister Souljah, in which the protagonist, the daughter of a crime boss, tries to regain her lifestyle and reputation after her father loses his empire. However, the protagonist uses mainly crime and manipulation to get what she wants, and looks down on getting a real job or an education. The result is that she ends up in jail and loses everything she ever cared about. The lesson? Crime doesn’t pay, go legit, and listen when people try to help you on the right path.

Another reason is that creators might want to explore territory previously unexplored, and characters whom you might sympathize or consider as heroes doesn’t allow that. Ever heard of Lolita? The entire story revolves around a man having a sexual/romantic relationship with a preteen girl and his attempts to control her and keep her with him forever. It’s a strange novel about desire, unreliable storytelling, and corruption (I think, anyway. I haven’t read this one yet, and given the subject matter, I’m not sure I want to), and it’s not a story we’d usually explore through the eyes of a likable protagonist.

Lolita: a great example of a book with an unlikeable protagonist.

Lolita: a great example of a book with an unlikeable protagonist.

And finally, there’s another reason: sometimes it’s just great fun! In certain stories with unsympathetic protagonists, you get a sort of excitement  that you don’t get from other stories, and this can come from the plot or the characters. In Gone Girl, for example, protagonist Nick Dunne is unlikable for any number of reasons, but you still follow along because you want to know if he really did do something to his wife, and if he’ll wiggle out of trouble whether or not he did do something. Another example we can look to is certain horror films, especially in the slasher genre, where the only mainstay is usually the villain and a lot of gory deaths. As part of that, slasher sequels often come to focus more and more on their villains, and people come back just to see these villains. Just ask anyone who enjoys a good Nightmare on Elm Street or Hellraiser film: they’re there for Freddy or the Cenobites, not for the horny teens who happen to be starring in the movie this time around.

So we’ve established why people create unlikable protagonists. The next question is, can you have a good and/or successful story with an unlikable protagonit? Well, I think that question was also answered above. The Red Shoes has been retold and revamped hundreds of times since Hans Christian Andersen first published his little morality tale. Lolita is considered one of the greatest works of modern and modern Russian literature, as well as one of the most controversial. Gone Girl was a runaway hit with a huge movie based on it. There is plenty of proof that unlikable protagonists can still be part of very good stories.

Neon Genesis Evangelion: great series, annoying lead.

Neon Genesis Evangelion: great series with an annoying lead.

Of course, this brings up another question: what makes a story with an unlikable protagonist good? Well, I often find that either the character is doing something pretty amazing, or the story or world is so amazing that even if you don’t like the character, you keep going for that story/world. Going back to Gone Girl, the protagonist is easy to dislike, but the mystery he’s wrapped up in is so intriguing that you want to find out more. That’s the example of a character doing something interesting. With an amazing story or world, I’d point to the anime Neon Genesis Evangelion: the protagonist is seriously unlikable, but the world he lives in is so cool–it involves teenagers piloting giant robots to fight aliens–that you just want to keep watching.

So you can have a story with a main character whom people may not like. As long as you give people a reason to keep reading or watching, it’s entirely possible. And who knows? Perhaps it’ll be one of the greatest stories ever written.

Just don’t do one centering around a pedophile. I think one of those is enough!

What’s your take on unlikable protagonists? Did I miss any good examples of the trope here in this post? 

*Oh, and in case anyone who’s not familiar is wondering, there is a difference between a hero and a protagonist. A hero is just that: a hero. They save lives, they fight evils, they are the ones we root for. A protagonist can be a hero and vice versa, but a protagonist is the main character, the person whom the story focuses on or from whose perspective we get the story. And as I outline in this post, that difference is bigger than one might think.

A Summary of This Year’s NaNoWriMo

Posted: December 1, 2016 in Living and Life, Novel, Progress Report, Writing
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The NaNoWriMo logo/coat of arms.

Well, it’s December 1st. That means a couple of things: start of the holiday season and prep for the new year, the days get to their shortest point, I try to push a tag with the hope that it will become a trend (so far, it’s been hit and miss with those I’ve tagged). For writers around the world, however, it means National Novel Writing Month, and assessing how each person did and how their manuscripts turned out.

I’ve actually always found National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo for short, full of strange contradictions. For one thing, it takes place around the world, but it’s kept “national.” Heck, even the month’s official website puts you in touch with participants from all over the world! Why don”t we change the name?

For another thing, it’s amazing how many authors take this challenge seriously. For those of you who don’t know, during the month of November, many writers try to write a fifty-thousand word novel within 30 days (that’s about 1667 words per day if you want the math). And I’ve seen so many author friends on Facebook and in blogs lament how they only got so many words down. “I only got eight-thousand words.” “I was so close to 50K!” “This NaNoWriMo sucked! I hardly got any work done.” I don’t even want to know what they thought of the material they wrote.

Just for clarification, there’s no actual prize if you write a 50K novel in 30 days. You just get bragging rights. But plenty of authors see it as a reflection of themselves if they can’t get the words down. And I actually kind of understand this: on nights when I didn’t write anything down (and those nights occurred quite often, sadly), I felt like it was some sort of reflection on my skills or on myself as a writer. It didn’t matter if there just wasn’t enough time before bed, or if I had a book I really wanted to read, or if I just didn’t feel like writing that night. I felt bad. Maybe not as bad as I could have felt, I have a day job that takes up a good chunk of time, so I at least have an excuse for why I’m not writing more. But I bet for those who write full-time, it could be very frustrating when they didn’t reach their goals.

So how did I do, now that we’re on the subject? Well, I knew that with a job and that unfortunate habit of sleeping seven hours a night, plus eating and bill-paying and grocery shopping and everything else that goes on in my life, I had only so much time to do any work. Therefore, I decided that I would keep my expectations reasonable. I decided that I would aim to get ten-thousand words done, and if I got past that, I would aim for another five-thousand afterwards. If I somehow managed to get past that, I’d aim for five-thousand more, and so on and so forth. The result was I probably felt less stress than my colleagues, and I consequently met my first goal, and got more than halfway to my second goal.

To be exact, I got 13,821 words down by the end of the month, about four-and-a-half chapters worth of story. It wasn’t easy, but I managed to do it. How did it turn out? Well, I guess as well as a first draft can turn out. I mean, it’s only in the subsequent drafts that novels actually become the brilliant stories we all hold so dear. During the first drafts, they’re like pre-Fairy Godmother Cinderella: full of beauty and potential but in need of some serious clean up. My own NaNoWriMo project, Full Circle, has a lot of good stuff in it so far. It’s the third book in my Reborn City series, and considering that I started this series about eight years ago, this novel is already showing my growth over that time the most more than any recent story I’ve written.

Still, I think Chapter 1 could use a lot of clean-up. There’s a lot of exposition there, so making it work with the real storytelling moments is important. And possibly the prologue could use some polish as well. Yeah, I included a prologue with this book. New thing for this series, but I think it’s good for this book. Just needs some edits.

In the meantime though, I still have an entire novel to finish, and it’ll probably be a lot longer than 50K. I’m hoping that I can finish it by mid-spring 2017, and have it out early 2018 at the latest. We’ll see what happens.

Well, that’s all for now. Unless there’s something worth posting about, I’ll try to put out a Writing/Reflections-themed post out at some point during that month. In the meantime, it’s writing, writing, writing, and hopefully a lot of it.

Until next time, my Followers of Fear!

I’m Trying Traditional Publishing Again

Posted: November 21, 2016 in Living and Life, Writing
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An author’s career is never a linear progression. It will often twist and turn and even take detours on occasion. It’s like driving through the American Appalachian mountains from Ohio to New York that way.

Similarly, my own writing career has not been linear in its progression. Back in college, as some of you may remember, I had trouble breaking into the traditional publishing scene. I couldn’t find an agent, and I was getting frustrated. Some friends of mine online had found some success self-publishing, so I went that route. And that’s kind of been my route since 2012 or so.

The problem is, self-publishing hasn’t gone the way I expected. I did it in the first place so that I could reach readers faster. And four books later, while I have reached readers, I haven’t reached as many readers as I would like. And while writers write to get stories out of our heads and onto the pages, and as a labor of love, writers publish because they want to share their stories with as many people as possible.

Now, one could argue that I just have to give it time, and the cosmos will make things work out. But if I’ve learned one thing in this business (and I’ve learned many things over the many years of writing), it’s that you have to try new things. And if one thing doesn’t work out, then to keep going at it just isn’t an option. In fact, that’s one definition of insanity. So, I have to try doing something different.

And I think that now is a really great time for me to try the traditional route again. Over four years, several college courses, reading works by a variety of excellent authors (and a few bad ones), and tons and tons of practice, I’m a much better novelist than I was. I think it could go well for me.

At the moment I’ve sent a few query letters out for Reborn City, which is my strongest work, and which I think, in the wake of the American presidential election, might go over well with agents. It’s a story set in a world very similar to what ours seems to be coming to, but with a bit more hope mixed in. If that doesn’t go well, I’ve got a million ideas, plenty of time to write, and a paying job to tide me over until I hit something that works.

Hey, if I can survive a nearly year-long job search and land a great job with an excellent organization, I can surely do this, maybe even over several years.

And if I’m lucky enough to get a contract with an agent and a publishing company, I might still self-publish from time to time. There are plenty of authors who do that. They’re called hybrid authors, and they usually self-publish when a story they wrote and really liked isn’t really what the publisher tends to go for. Heck, I think His Royal Scariness, Stephen King does this from time to time. Or maybe just the once.

In the meantime, I hope you continue to support me as a person and as a writer. And if you want to read one of my books, I’d be so happy if you did. It would certainly make my day.

Wish me luck, my Followers of Fear, as I set out on this latest fork in the road that is my writing career.

NaNoWriMo update: As of this weekend, I’m over ten-thousand words on Full Circle. And my God, it’s coming along great. True, it’s the usual quality of first drafts,  but I think FC really shows how much I’ve progressed as a writer from Reborn City. I can’t wait to see what people think of it when they read it.

 

Review: Lights Out (2016 film)

Posted: November 10, 2016 in Review, Scary Stuff
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This was the horror movie I really wanted to see this summer but totally missed due to how far I live from the nearest movie theater and how much moving costs. I was delighted when my copy from the library came in this past week, I had to get it and watch it. So, over dinner, I watched. And I had to say, this was a fun horror movie. Definitely deserves the good reviews it’s getting.

Lights Out is about a young woman who returns to her childhood home after she gets a call about her half-brother falling asleep in class, and their mother can’t be reached. At first the young woman thinks it’s her mother’s mental illness resurfacing, but it soon becomes apparent that the family is being haunted by Diana, a vengeful apparition who met the mother while alive and who draws her power from the darkness. And she’s not about to let any of them go.

This movie definitely has a lot going for it. Filmed on less than five million dollars, the film uses almost entirely practical effects, which I love. I especially love the villain Diana, who is scariest when you only see her as a dark silhouette with two glowing blue eyes. The filmmakers knew this too, only showing Diana once out of silhouette, which actually wasn’t that scary. Weirdly enough, I actually felt a lot of sympathy for Diana. I don’t do well in sunlight either, so I understand her aversion to life. I wonder what a character like her would be like as a protagonist.

Hey, story idea forming…

As for the actors, they all give very good performances. The characters are all pretty basic, but the actors take what they’re given and give it their all, making the characters believable and sympathetic. The one exception to this would be the mother character Sophie, but not for the reasons you might think. Of all the characters, Sophie has the best character arc. I won’t give away spoilers, but you do see her go through a transformation as she comes to realize the truth of her ghostly friend. It’s also refreshing to see a character with mental illness shown not as evil or murderous, but as an actual person dealing with an illness and a very tough situation.

Obviously, the use of shadow and light in this film is phenomenal, making you feel the dark as menacing and wishing for the light. I also liked the writing, which culminated in an ending that honestly surprised me. Usually I can predict how a story ends, but this time, I was unable to. Very nicely done on the part of the writers.

If there are things that could have been improved upon with this film, I would’ve liked to see the protagonist’s earlier experiences with Diana, which are only shown once and never picked up on again (and we get hints that there’s more to that part of the story that we never see, so that makes me mad). There’s also a moment when you can clearly see the actress playing Diana in a black bodysuit, which takes away from the horror of the moment. But that’s about it in terms of complaints.

I really wish I could’ve watched this film in the dark of a movie theater, like it was meant to, but unfortunately I watched it in my living room with the lights on, and that really affected my experience with the film. I’m pretty sure I would’ve been more scared if I’d seen it in the dark. Well, hindsight’s 20/20 after all.

All in all, I’m giving Lights Out a 4.3 out of 5. It’s scary, fun, and definitely worth a watch in the dark. Just make sure to have a flashlight nearby when you watch, okay?

NaNoWriMo update: As of last writing session, I am a little under five-thousand words. Still not very far into Full Circle, but I’m making progress. I don’t think I’ll make fifty-thousand words by the end of the month, but I think fifteen-thousand is a pretty achievable goal.

Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

Posted: November 5, 2016 in Living and Life, Writing
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Last night, I went to a dinner for young Jewish professionals in Columbus, the kind where one can socialize with other members of the tribe in the same age group while enjoying a kosher meal and an open bar. I love these dinners when they’re held: you can see people you know or have never met before, have conversations with similar threads about a thousand times over, forget most of what’s said, and still have a good time, all while enjoying a kosher meal. And, on occasion, I meet people who are interested in reading my books, so I make sure to have the latest business card with me when I do go to these things.

At last night’s dinner though, I had an interesting encounter that I feel like blogging about, if only to get it out of my system. While walking around between conversations, I ran into a guy I was acquainted with, who we’ll call “Eric,” a friend of a friend I knew in high school. The first time I’d met Eric had been at one of these dinners, and he’d seemed pretty impressed when I’d mentioned I was a published author I ‘d given him my card then, and had hoped that he would maybe check out one of my books and let me know what he thought.

To my surprise, pretty quickly Eric told me he read my books, and enjoyed them, had said I was talented and had an amazing style. I was flattered…for a second. But there was just something that felt…a little off. The amount of enthusiasm, the look in his eyes, the body language. I asked if he would consider writing a review for one of my books online, and he said he would, he totally would. Again, the way Eric said “totally” and the way he moved his body while he said it, like he was trying to distract me with the movement of his arms, just seemed off. Finally I asked him to name one of the books he’d read and enjoyed. As I half-expected, he couldn’t name a single one. At that point, I just gave him a card and moved on.

There are a lot of reasons why people don’t read my books. I’m not still very well-known, my books cost money and aren’t available at a lot of libraries, some people don”t like to read, some people don’t care for the genres I tend to write in, busy lives, they lose my card, or a number of other reasons. If Eric had said any of those from the beginning, I would’ve been cool with it. I’ve dealt with close family and friends who haven’t read Video Rage yet. I’m not happy about it, but I accept it because I know that I can’t control other people’s lives or what they do in their lives. But outright lying? I’m just not cool with that.

I put a lot of work into the stories I write. Yes, they’re mostly a labor of love (or a reason to get them out of my head and onto the page so it’s a bit less cluttered up there), but I want others to enjoy them as well. And Eric may have felt guilty that he said he’d check them out the last time we’d spoke and that he hadn’t, but lying about it, especially when it’s so obvious, doesn’t help. For one thing, it gets my hopes up needlessly that I’ve touched another person with my work before causing those hopes to plummet into my shoes. For another, lying about reading a book (let alone four) is one of the easiest to debunk. I debunked it in a single sentence! And that just make things awkward.

I guess what I’m trying to say here is, if you haven’t read a book, just say so. Don’t try to lie about it. We authors are used to it, and most of us aren’t sensitive enough that we throw hissy fits when we find out you didn’t read our books. And if you do read our books, thank you. We hope you enjoy them, and let us know if you did.

NaNoWriMo update: Five days in, and I’m a bit over twenty-four hundred words into Full Circle. I haven’t had that much time to write since Thursday, so this is the most I’ve been able to get. Still, the fact that I made it this far in the first week is still pretty nice. Hopefully I’ll get a bit farther along tonight. Wish me luck!

Reborn City: Three Year Anniversary, Full Circle, and NaNoWriMo

Posted: November 1, 2016 in Living and Life, Novel, Reflections, Writing
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Reborn City, my first published novel

Reborn City, my first published novel

One hot summer day eight years ago, a young high schooler was walking home from the library with the plan to stop by Dairy Queen and grab some ice cream. While he was walking, he was listening to a new CD he’d picked up from the library, the soundtrack to a movie he really liked. And while he listened to the first track, a rock/hip-hop style song called “Stoopid Ass,” he found himself thinking of another movie he’d seen recently and really enjoyed, Freedom Writers. He loved that movie, about how gangsters were inspired by a teacher to be more than what they and others thought they could be. The high schooler thought about how the song he was listening to might have fit well on the soundtrack for that movie as well. And then, very casually, he thought to himself, “I should write a gangster story.”

And like that, ideas started exploding like fireworks in his head. He began thinking of ways to make it more unique compared to other gangster stories, where to set it, what sort of characters there should be. He spent the rest of the afternoon thinking of his new story and what kind of story it could become. The very next spring, he started writing it, making a few notes in a notebook before creating an outline on a laptop in his mother’s basement, which was his usual writing space in those days. Over two years, he wrote and wrote, until about a month before he graduated high school, he finished his new novel, Reborn City, a story about street gangs in a dystopian future and the trials they face while trying to find a life better than the ones they’re currently living in.

In college, he edited and edited, and had a friend help him make sure he missed nothing with the final draft. Because he wasn’t having that much luck finding an agent or a publisher, he took advantage of the growing self-publishing industry, and published Reborn City on November 1st, 2013. Some months later he finished writing the sequel, Video Rage, which he’d begun writing over the previous summer, and which he published in June 2016, the day after he moved into a new apartment to be closer to a new job. And today, on November 1st, 2016, he’s going to start the final novel in the Reborn City series, Full Circle.

Video Rage, the second book in the RC series.

Video Rage, the second book in the RC series.

Switching to first person, I’m very excited that I’m finally at this juncture at this series. The Reborn City series has been a labor of love for so long, about seven or eight years worth of sweat, blood and tears. And it’s been worth it. A lot of people–some of whom are not related to me and obligated to read my books, surprisingly–have discovered the series and enjoyed reading it. Nobody’s told me yet that the series has changed their lives (I hear that’s rare anyway), but they’ve told me how they identified with the characters, or how imaginative the world of the story is. And one person told me that some of the themes in the book–racism, Islamapohobia, terrorism, urban violence, etc.–make the series pretty relevant to today’s problems, which I feel is quite the compliment.

And tonight after work, I’ll be starting the final book, Full Circle. Honestly, I’m a little surprised that I’ve made it so far. Even after Video Rage came out, I kind of felt towards Full Circle like George Washington and Benjamin Franklin probably thought about the end of the millennium: it’ll happen, but it’s so far away, why even bother thinking about it?  And now I’m about to start work on it, on the same day I published the first book in the series. Boy, did it creep up on me.

You know, in a strange way, I feel like I’ve come full circle, just like this book’s title. When I published the first book, I felt like I was starting something really big, even if the book never sold a million copies or was well-reviewed. And now that I’m starting the final book, it feels like I’m starting the beginning of the end of something, in more ways than one. It’s really exciting, and I can’t wait to see where it brings me.

So, what can readers expect from the last book? Well, I’ll keep the spoilers away for readers who haven’t read the books yet and might want to, but I’ve got some fun stuff planned for Full Circle. For example:

  • I’ve got a great line-up of antagonists. I always knew for the final book, I wanted bad guys like nothing seen before in the series. And I’ve come up with those villains. As a group, they’re called the Navagraha, which is a Hindu form of astrology revolving around seven gods and two demons, and they’re going to push the main characters in ways they’ve never been pushed before. You’ll also get to see an old foe of the main characters, Jason Price, transformed in ways that make him even more evil than he was before. I’m going to have fun exploring his character in this new role for him.
  • New revelations and challenges. In addition to the Navagraha and the challenges those guys pose, the main characters will have to deal with some changes that they never saw coming. Our male lead Rip will learn things about his past, a past that he thought was lost to him. And Iori will find herself in an unimaginable position, and what she decides to do once there will affect her in so many different ways. Not to mention, finding herself in this position brings about new choices for the main characters, new paths they can take on the road of life that they thought closed to them.
    I know, sounds very vague. But I’ve been setting some of these things up since as far back as the first book, and I’m looking forward to writing them. When you, dear Followers, read them, I hope you find them just as enjoyable.
  • I’ll be doing my best George RR Martin impression. By that, I mean I’ll be killing off a lot of characters, including ones that readers may really like and be attached to (you thought that I was going to have lots of politics and gratuitous sex, didn’t you? Nope, not that kind of series). I really don’t want to kill off some of these characters, but I feel like it’s best for the story if I do. So get your tissues ready. I’m wielding an executioner’s axe with my laptop, and it’s about to rain heads.

That’s all for now. As it’s National Novel Writing Month, I don’t know if I’ll be very active on the blog this month. You know, trying to get as much of fifty-thousand words in a month written as possible. But I hope you’ll still continue to support me as I work hard to finish this series and bring the final book to you guys. In the meantime, if you would like to check out Reborn City and Video Rage, I’ll post the links below. If you end up getting a copy, and you like what you read, please let me know what you. Positive or negative, I love feedback from readers on my work, and I would love yours.

Until next time, my Followers of Fear!

Reborn City: Available from Amazon, Createspace, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Smashwords, and Kobo

Video Rage: Available from Amazon, Kindle, Createspace, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Smashwords, and Kobo

5,000 Likes!!! A Very Big Milestone!

Posted: October 10, 2016 in Living and Life
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Likes is a sign of approval. They say, “Something about your post resonated with me. I’m letting you know that.” They’re not as engaging as a comment, which leads to conversations, or as gratifying as a subscription, which shows that someone liked what you posted enough to want to come back for more, but they’re nice to have.

And as of this morning, I’ve reached a very big milestone with the number of likes. Yes, that’s right, I’ve gotten to five-thousand likes!

Wow, you people are enthusiastic. I like it.

I’m very happy that I was able to make it to this milestone. I’ve mentioned it before, but when I first started out blogging, I didn’t get a lot of views, let alone likes, comments, or subscriptions. It was disheartening, logging in day after day, and seeing maybe a view or two every seven or eight days. At times like that, I thought about giving up blogging.

Call it stubbornness or ambition or just plain narcissism (I think all authors wanting to share their works with people have a bit of that in them), but I kept at it. And somehow, you all came. You liked, commented, subscribed. Heck, sometimes you even reblog. And a few of you even bought my books when I put them out.

And now this. After over five years of blogging, I’ve gotten five-thousand likes. Thank you. Thanks to everyone who’s liked the words I put out there in cyberspace, and thanks especially to nalindesignprofile, Victo Dolore, acidburnshorrorshow, and Joleene Naylor for giving me the final four likes necessary to get this far. I couldn’t have done it without you guys.

Well, that’s ll for now, folks. I’ve got a busy day ahead of me, as well as a busy rest of October. If there’s anything to post about, I’ll make sure to do so. Until then, have a great day, my Followers of Fear!

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