Part Four: The Trap is out right now!!!

A thousand apologies to those of you eagerly waiting for this next installment and therefore disappointed by its tardiness.

I’ve learned some good life (and writing) lessons in the meantime, and although I would love to promise that I won’t be late getting a book out again, that’s just plain unrealistic for an author, I guess.

Or at least at the moment while I’m juggling so many things, it is. All it takes is for a couple of big university assignments to come along, plus one sick wife needing me to do more at home, and there goes most of my writing time.

Ideally, in the future, when I can earn enough money doing this to support my family through it, well, I should be able to do even better at things like consistency. I suppose in some ways I’m fortunate to have such a small fan base right now; less people to disappoint.

But I trust the readers that I do have to understand that life is life, and is, therefore,  by nature, predictably unpredictable.

Anywho.. Apologetic rambling over. Let’s talk The Trap.

For those of you new to this game, this is Part Four of The Arthur Lien Abductions, a YA, urban fantasy mystery that I’ve expanded from a short story I wrote last year into a novel-length work, to help raise money for my brother, Tyler, (after whom my protagonist is named) and his chemotherapy and continued treatments. (You can read more about that here.)

It’s such an interesting process, writing a larger work, but publishing pieces as I go. It gives me very little time to actually focus on a section of the story in-depth. And then it’s gone. Done. Out there. Unretractable.

It means that I worry about the continuity of the larger work a lot. Far too much, considering that I intend to release a novelised version when I’m done. Which honestly isn’t far off.

It also means though, that each section is like a different project in its own way, because just as I feel like my writing gets better with every short story I write, I also feel like each part of the book gets better than the one before it.

Now, you may think this is entirely natural, but it’s left me with some rather odd feelings, as I look back at Part One – without actually reading through it of course, because I’m not that intelligent – and think that it was so much worse than Part Four, and what if nobody ever gets to Part Four because they were turned off by my less professional writing three or four months ago?

Silly, isn’t it?

It’s funny how self-critical we can be like that, because I know logically, when I take a break for a week to focus on other things while my beta readers get back to me with feedback, I always have a tendency to surprise myself by how good what I actually wrote was/is.

Now, that’s not to toot my own horn or anything. What I personally love in regards to the written word or the unfolding of a story may not speak to or interest you. But I think it reveals something, if not about human nature, then at the very least about my own; that as I learn and continue to progress in my writing, or in any part of my life, I’m so assured of my own growth and progress, that I have a tendency to think that what I accomplished before is somehow lesser as a result.

Now, yes, there are a few parts of Part One: The Secret that I might change now, knowing what I know about the story and the characters, not to mention my own writing, but that by no means means that it’s bad. I know full well that when I do my whole book cohesion edit after Part Five come out, that I’m going to smile like a little boy because I’ve written something the little boy in me would love to read. Even if I could do an even better job the second time around.

Either way, it’s been an absolutely awesome experience writing Part Four, and it’s definitely the most horrifying one yet. If any one of them could be called a horror book, it’s this one.

It’s actually really funny when you look at all of the covers so far, lined up next to one another, because they get progressively “darker” in theme with each one. And this one, though the quickest in process, was definitely the hardest to draw.

As always, with the release of Part Four: The Trap, (only US$1.99) Part Three: The Quest, Part Two: The Mystery and Part One: The Secret are all down to only 99c (US) each on Amazon Kindle! So grab your copy today!

And please share with any of your friends into YA urban fantasy/mystery, and help support Tyler’s ongoing care. Thank you!

P.S. I’ve been formulating the next project after this one, and I’m already so excited for it. Just you wait!

The Wait Is Over: part two is out NOW!

Yes, that’s right, Part Two: The Mystery is out RIGHT NOW on Amazon for $1.99 (US).

*SPOILER ALERT* – I’ve tried hard to avoid outright spoilers below, but the hints are definitely there. Plus certain other things you may prefer to find out yourself by reading the story. If so, please feel free to click on the link above and purchase your copy today. – *SPOILER ALERT*

When I wrote the short story that was the original idea behind this novel-in-five-parts, it was purely my Tyler character’s perspective. He was the protagonist and he protagged quite well, I thought.

When turning this story into a novel-length work, however, I quickly realised that I needed more central characters. I also realised that the plot needed to be bigger, with more twists and turns, and have a much more satisfying ending.

Thus Jill Horner came to life.

She was referenced by another character in the original short story, but never appeared until Part One of the novel. As Part One progressed, Jill became a force of her own, dominating more and more of the story, until eventually, I realised that there was no way she wasn’t as equally important.

This was no longer a story about Tyler. This was a story about Tyler and Jill.

So when plotting out Part Two, I decided to switch POVs, to really get inside Jill’s head, knowing that it would add a lot of depth to story. Plus, I had a sneaking suspicion that she was going to be most people’s favourite character.

Then I realised that I could do a lot of fun things with gaps and silences and raising tension by switching POVs between every part of the book. Thus my overarching plot came further to life.

I was originally a little worried when I started writing Part Two, that it wouldn’t keep up the same sense of pace and action that Part One had had. I was delightfully proven wrong however.

The more I write this story, the more each part seems to come alive. It’s like the story is writing itself. And it gets better and better.

Case in point, I had a nice ending all planned out for Part Two. It would raise tension, but also be wonderfully fulfilling for the reader. People need an awww-yeah! moment at the end of Part Two. While I was writing the final chapter, however, Jill surprised me. She didn’t respond how I thought she would. How I’d planned that she would. Thereby changing the whole ending.

I was shocked. Which, I know, seems ridiculous.

“But how can your character surprise you? You wrote them.”

Well, yes. But characters come alive as you write them. The more details of their past, their personality get filled in, they become more defined. More definitive. Jill responded as Jill would have in that situation. And as it turns out, it made for a better story.

The biggest thing that can vouch for this isn’t my own shock however. It was the response of my father, who proofreads all my writing for me.

He actually gave me an emotional response to my story.

I know that doesn’t sound like much, but for anyone who knows my father, you might be able to understand that one of the reasons I get him to proofread my work is because he’s very good at never giving me anything but spelling and grammar feedback. He likes his paperback westerns, but doesn’t relate to YA urban scifi/fantasy.

Originally, I found this a little frustrating/disheartening, but quickly came to grips with it and quite happily took advantage of eagerness to help tidy up my work, finding other close friends to beta-read for me for the rest of it.

That said, I actually got an emotional response out of him after reading Part Two.

Well, I must be doing something right.

I’ve tried recounting all this in the most oblique way possible as to not spoil anything for those of you excited to read the story.

You can get your very own eBook copy right here.

As with every part in this series, all proceeds will go to my brother Tyler’s cancer treatment and rehabilitation costs. For more information, read my previous blog about it here.

And last, but certainly not least, with the release of Part Two: The Mystery, Part One: The Secret is now down to only $0.99 (US). Get your copy here.

I Am Not A Serial Killer: a YA urban fantasy with a twist

As you may know from my blog a few weeks’ ago, I’ve come to really love the Writing Excuses podcast over the last month. I began listening to it because of my love of all things Sanderson, but wasn’t particularly familiar with the other three podcasters, except for Howard Tayler, whom I’d seen cover a couple of Brandon’s lectures while he was on a book tour.

So after hearing Dan Wells talk about his writing on the podcast for weeks, I decided I needed to read his John Cleaver series that he’s always talking about. So I got the eBook and began reading it every now and then on my phone, when I didn’t have my hard copy of Assassin’s Quest (that I’m also and still currently reading) on me.

Well, seeing that I Am Not A Serial Killer is only maybe a quarter or a fifth the size of Assassin’s Quest, I  obviously finished it first. (A review of the latter is also coming soon for those of you eagerly awaiting it) I’m going to try and not give any huge spoilers, but I think there are certain things worth discussing about the book.

Firsty first things firstly, you should know that this book is YA urban fantasy, but doesn’t seem so immediately. Like Twilight, it takes place very much in the regular world, but unlike Twilight, instead delving piece by piece into the fantastique, it takes you completely by surprise two-fifths of the way through. This can be jarring for a great deal of readers.

It’s not like Wells didn’t do his share of foreshadowing. My inner-monologue just responded something like this: What??? So it’s not a story about A, it’s a story about B. Well, that’s disappointing. I wish he’d hinted more heavily at this earlier… oh wait, yeah, no, he did, I guess. But wayyy too subtly. So yes, he did do a good job, I loved the writing style and character voice, I just think the narrative structure could have been done a little better.

I, and I imagine a lot of other readers, felt that the story set itself up as something other than what it turned out to be. It’s like if Twilight had have appeared very much like a normal high school romance from the get-go, Edward was moody and seemed to hate her, but then no van-skid-on-ice scene or anything happened and suddenly one night Edward kidnaps her super speed style from her room and takes her to the lone meadow in the woods where he’s going to devour her, but somehow she manages to convince him he’s better than that and they fall in love.

See how, while potentially awesome and interesting, it’s not as good? Maybe you think that sounds more interesting, and to each their own, but I think that that example and Serial Killer both skip a few radical steps in the natural series of progression or escalation that you need to satisfy the readers. Otherwise their expectations are violated. We love twists that surprise within the realm of that’s-brilliant-we-should-have-seen-that-coming, not twists that seem to betray the whole fundamental type of story that is being told.

You’d think after my little pseudo-rant there that I didn’t enjoy the book, but that would be untrue. I think the fact that, otherwise, it was so very captivating is what makes this one problem for me such a big deal. Because everything else was soooo very good. The characterisation, the character himself and other plot-twists and escalating tensions in the book, even the humour!

Honestly, if it weren’t for this one thing, I would happily give this book a 4.5-marshmallow rating (probably even 5-marshamallow because it was his first book) As it is though, I’m still going to give four marshmallows, because I do think it was pretty great. I just wish I could have given it more. Hopefully, being aware of this large twist will be enough preparation for you that, should you choose to read it, (and I still recommend that you do) you will not be as taken aback as I was.