"Death Devours All Lovely Things" Released, Plus Infinity Trials Updates

For anyone who's just dying to delve deeper into the backstory of The Infinity Trials, I just released a 100-page novella that focuses on the history of Edwin, the grumpy vampire introduced at the end of "Boy in the Mirror," who acts as Jacqueline's guide for the remainder of the series. It's a story that goes from 19th century Ireland to America in the near future—or at least one of the many futures that are possible in the overarching world I've created. 

I'll post the blurb now, but please read on after the buy links for updates on how the final Infinity Trials volume is progressing.

DEATH DEVOURS ALL LOVELY THINGS

Edwin Vyse has never found the balance between being a man and a monster. For all of his unnaturally long vampiric life, he's been alone, never felt the sun on his skin, and been forced to kill to survive. His life, if that's what it can be called, has been a persistent dance along the edges of reality, a fever dream he cannot awaken from.

When fate brings him into the orbit of a beautiful graduate student, however, things begin to change. Maybe love can, indeed, kill the beast. So long as his monstrous nature doesn’t ruin everything.

Robert J. Duperre presents an epic novella of love, loss, and murder, chronicling the life of one of the major supporting characters in his urban fantasy series, The Infinity Trials.

Ebook available now at:
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Kobobooks
Google Play
iTunes (Coming Soon)
Smashwords

Now, on to how the final book in the series is progressing.

Let me just say this—I've had far more difficulty with "God in the Girl" than any other book I've written. Personal tragedies and the subsequent depression have made me put the book on hold for long stretches, which has led to me having to re-familiarize myself with the story whenever I've gone back. This is a complex story, with many moving parts, and tying together all the different plot threads in a satisfactory manner can be mind-numbing at times.

However, it's starting to flow a little more freely now. I'm roughly halfway done, and I'm confident that once the momentum of the end starts rolling, so will the speed (and competence) of my writing. I'm not going to give a time frame for when the book will go live. When it's finished, it's finished, and I refuse to rush it. "God in the Girl" will be the culmination of my vision for an entire shared world, so I have to be careful with it, which includes being diligent with edits so that it flows well and tells you, the reader, everything I wish for you to know. 

So please don't worry. It'll get done, probably more sooner than later.

'Til next time!

The Great Glitterbeard Challenge

In 2011, I was feeling in a rut. I had a book to write, and the idea was solid in my head, but for whatever reason, my inspiration failed me. In order to remedy the situation, I called a good friend of mine and challenged her to a writing competition. The details of the challenge aren't necessarily important; what is important is the fact that simply being engaged in a challenge that I could actually lose spurred me onward. I put my head down and worked, and in forty-eight days later, I put the finishing touches on a little book called Silas.

So here we are, almost five years later, and I find myself in the same position. I've been putting off writing the third book in the Covenant series, and it's time for me to find a way to kick myself in the ass. That means I had to get back in contact with my old friend and together cobble together another challenge that will help put our production into overdrive.

So hey, Mercedes Yardley...I CHALLENGE YOU!

Yup, that's her. And okay, she was the one who actually put forth the challenge to me when I complained about not feeling motivated, but hey, let's not split hairs, okay?

So this is the way this challenge will work: Once the starting gun sounds tomorrow morning, the first writer to reach 90,000 words combined in their various projects wins. It's simple, right? That's the beauty of it. And you know what else is beautiful? The fact that winning pretty much means you're the awesomest awesomesause in awesomeland.

But for the loser...ah, the loser. Here's the catch. Public embarrassment is always a great motivator, right? Of course it is. Which is why Mercedes proposed that the loser has to dress themselves up in a glitter beard, take a picture, and use that as their public profile picture for a whole month. A WHOLE DAMN MONTH! And in case you don't know what such a thing as a glitter beard might look like, well...

Or something like that.

As you can plainly see, this is not a challenge either of is will be keen on losing. Oh the humanity! And to keep myself honest, I'll be sure to post regular word-count updates. When? Not entirely sure. It's a work in progress, I say with a shrug.

So there you have it. Once again, the gauntlet has been thrown, Mrs. Yardley.

Let the best alien being win!

(And I'll likely be greeting everyone glittered up in a few months. Dammit.)

Check out Mercedes' blog, A Broken Laptop, or visit her Amazon Author Page. Trust me, it's worth it.

All about me!

Would you look at that. I haven’t posted anything to this blog in over a year. To think I used to post three or four times a week. And almost none of them were about myself. Madness!

Well, to keep with the theme, I guess I have to write about myself again. A lot of stuff has gone on since I announced the sale of The Breaking World to 47North, and I should really get all those who’re interested updated.

First off, all three books in the initial run of the fantasy series Dave and I wrote are now complete. Dawn of Swords was published in January, while Wrath of Lions is set to be released on April 22^nd. Add to that the fact that Blood of Gods is perilously close to being sent to copyediting, and you can tell how busy of a year it’s been for me. That’s 620,000 words of fiction written in 15 months. Something I never thought would be accomplished, has been. And I couldn’t be happier.

In other news (and this should’ve been posted a long while back), over the course of two months, from August until October of this past year (and while writing the rough draft of Wrath of Lions), I went through and did a complete re-edit of the entire Rift series. That was something I’ve been pining to do for a very long time. There were just certain things about the series that wore on me, from typos to style to an ending that I (and a number of reader) felt was rushed. So I dove in and made over three thousand corrections, as well as added an extra 10,000 words, most of which come at the book’s climax. Hopefully, the added material will make the final battle feel much more real, and add some much-needed closure for characters that had been unfairly ignored by me. Personally, I think it enhances the story greatly.

As it stands, the revised version of The Rift is only available in the four-book omnibus. For now, the individual books remain the same as they were when they were originally published, though only available in e-book format. The print version of the series is now offered in two separate volumes. Also, unlike when I first put the omnibus together last year, the digital version contains all of Jesse’s awesome artwork. Yay for progress!

Oh, and now The Fall e-book is permanently available for free, so there's that as well.

So we have the Breaking World books and The Rift news. To add to that, there’s a short story I wrote coming down the pike any day now. The story’s called Silence, and it will be included in Shock Totem issue 8.5, which is a collection of love stories told with a horror slant. The story I submitted might be my favorite ever, so I can’t wait for the day that gets released. Oh, and there’s also another short I’m writing for an invite-only anthology called My Peculiar Family. The story’s not finished yet, but it will be in the next day or so, and it’ll be another good one when it is. Thanks, Kristi, for inviting me! That anthology should see the light of day sometime at the end of the summer of 2014.

All of which begs the question: where is Rob going from here? Well, Dave and I still have three more books to write together—Kings of Ruin, Prince of Beasts, and Queen of Lies—in order to finish off our tale of Dezrel’s beginnings. To be honest, after writing the first three books in that series so damn quickly, we’re both suffering from a bit of burnout, so we’re going to put off starting those for a little bit. In the meantime, I’m going to go ahead and write the rough draft of The Mirror of Souls, which was placed on the backburner when the opportunity to work with Dave came about. That story’s all I’ve been able to think about for a couple weeks now, and I can’t wait to dive in. Jacqueline Talbot is calling out to me, folks. Tell my story, she says, and rather creepily at that. I’m getting the shivers just thinking about it!

However, just because I’m writing that book doesn’t mean it’s going to be released anytime soon. I’m still not sure what I’m going to do with it. I haven’t decided if I want to self-publish or find a home with an actual publisher (if that’s even an option). Another thing to take into consideration is books 4-6 of The Breaking World. Should the pressure mount to dive into that world once more, that’s something I’ll have to do. If that happens, any public sighting of Jacqueline’s first solo effort would be delayed indefinitely. While I do plan on having the rough draft finished by the end of April, I couldn’t justify putting out a single tome of a four-book series, only to let the readers sway in the wind for a year or two. Nope, not gonna happen.

In other words, everything’s still up in the air. All I do know is that I have two short stories and two more books coming out in the next eight months. And that, in and of itself, is something to be excited about.

Thanks for stopping by and listening, and hopefully I can start keeping this blog a little more active than it’s been.

But no promises. :-)

Rob D

Announcing "The Breaking World"

First of all, I would like to take this moment to announce the big news of the day. My good friend David Dalglish and I have signed a publishing deal with 47North, an arm of Amazon Publishing. The deal is for three books, all co-written by Dave and myself. The series will be titled The Breaking World, and will chronicle the birth of humanity upon Dezrel, the world in which all of Dave’s many, many novels take place, and the war between the two brother gods around whom a great number of his plots center. To say we’re both quite excited about this would be an understatement. For information’s sake, the books will be as follows:

  

Dawn of Swords (sometime in January, 2014)

Wrath of Lions (TBA)

Blood of Gods (TBA)

It really is quite fitting that I post the announcement on this particular blog, which has gone criminally underused for the past year. Because it was in this very space that the groundwork for the friendship that would eventually result in a rewarding collaboration was laid.

  

Three years ago, after much frustration, I decided to take the plunge and begin self-publishing The Rift, a series of post-apocalyptic novels I’d been working on for years. I entered the Kindle publishing world, which had just begun to make headway and gain a name for itself. Reviews were difficult to come by, as I was one of thousands to take the plunge at about the same time. I saw many of my brethren having the same difficulties, and so I dusted off this blog, which had been languishing for some time, and decided that I would pitch my services as a reviewer to the countless self-pubbers who frequented a site called Kindleboards. A great many authors added their names to the list, and my side career as an amateur reviewer began.

This is where Dave Dalglish enters the picture...but first, a bit of background. As far as being a reader goes, I’m really not as well read in genre fiction as a lot of folks out there. I dabbled in the classics a lot when I was younger, but as I grew older, I ended up limiting my reading material to pretty much horror and horror only. In fact, as far as genres go, the one I pretty much ignored was fantasy. I hadn’t read a book featuring swords and sorcery since I picked up RA Salvatore’s The Crystal Shard back in high school. (Which, trust me, was a long time ago.) That was about to change.

So on this list of books to be read and reviewed appeared The Weight of Blood, a dark journey starring a couple disenfranchised half-orc brothers written by a lithe redhead named David Dalglish. I absolutely fell in love with the book. Was it perfect? No, of course not. However, there was so much there, deep stuff, philosophical stuff that I just couldn’t overlook, whether Dave intended them or not. It was the second work of fantasy I’d read since starting the reviews, and I was hooked. A new love affair had begun.

Every book Dave wrote, I devoured. (In fact, The Cost of Betrayal, the second Half-Orc book, I still consider to be one of my favorites ever, in any genre.) We began chatting online, and a friendship was struck. During his later books, he would call me to discuss plot ideas, and I’d like to think that I was able to be of some help. I became enraptured by his world, almost to a scholarly level. So immersed was I that I began to understand Dezrel and what happened within it as much as I understood what was happening in my own writing.

 

One thing that always intrigued me was the Gods’ War, which many of his books reference. I’d often ask him if he was ever going to write it, and he said he had no plans to. (In the interview linked at the bottom of this post, Dave himself describes his feelings on the subject.) I thought that was a shame, as the storyline had so much potential, but at the same time a writer’s gotta do what a writer’s gotta do. If he didn’t feel inspired by the material, best not to pen it or you’ll come out with a substandard product.

 

Fast forward to 2012, when I was putting the finishing touches on The Summer Son, the last of the Rift books. Dave asked me what project I planned on doing next, and I told him I was wavering between ideas at the moment. “Why don’t you write the prequel books with me,” he then said. “You know, the war between Ashhur and Karak.”

I just about fell out of my chair.

 

Full disclosure here: For a long while, I had actually hoped this offer would be made. During my many hours spent reading Dave’s novels, I’d developed a mental picture (and even quite a few written notes) of what life would be like in early Dezrel, hashed out a few storylines that needed telling, and stashed them away as maybe something to give my friend if he ever decided to start the project, or, gasp, maybe wanted me to help write them. And then there it was, falling right into my lap—the opportunity to not only write in a world I loved, but write with a man I admire and who has come to become one of my closest of friends, one with whom I share a great deal of values and beliefs, though we come from vastly different backgrounds. Not only that, but I knew we would work well together, since probably the best short story I ever wrote, The One that Matters, which appeared in his Land of Ash compilation, was a tale I had no confidence in until Dave cleaned it up, removed unnecessary filler, and helped make it what it became. That’s when I knew that the two of us working together could create something great.

I had an outline ready for him almost immediately (an easy task given my previous note-taking), and after his enthusiastic approval, it was off to the races. I worked on the rough draft, constantly calling Dave to keep the storyline consistent and fix quite a few aspects of the plot that I couldn’t find resolutions to. Then, when the hulking manuscript was finished, Dave took it and began a round of heavy edits. What ended up coming out when all was said and done is a book that is far and away the best piece of literature I’ve ever had my name attached to. See, that’s the thing with this collaboration; areas I struggle in Dave is expert at, and visa versa. Balance, people. Celestia would be quite proud. (Anyone who knows Dave’s work will appreciate that statement.)

 

And in the middle of all this, something wondrous happened. Dave got out of a bad representation deal and, all of a sudden, he had a deal with big-six publisher Orbit for his Shadowdance novels and our collaboration was going to have Amazon’s mighty sword behind it. A book that had been a labor of love, that had been slated to be self-published, was now going to find a home with a real, live publisher. Now, I will freely admit that just having Dave’s name on a project pretty much guarantees it success (and I lucked out greatly there), but this was beyond my wildest dreams. I even got hooked up with uber-agent Michael Carr because of this, one of the nicest and hardest-working men I’ve ever come across, who obviously deserves a great amount of credit for these deals being completed.

So there you have it. Really, though I put a ton of work into the project, it’s Dave who deserves the lion’s share of praise here. He was the one who believed in what I had to offer, his rewriting skills were on-point, and hell, he was the one who created this whole wonderful backdrop in the first place! Without Dave Dalglish, there’s no Dezrel, there’s no Half-Orcs, there’s no Shadowdance, and there sure as hell isn’t any Breaking World. I owe him so much, not the least of which is being a great friend when I needed one most.

So thanks, Dave! Not like you don’t know this already, but you’re the greatest, as a man as well as an author. And thanks to 47North as well, for taking a chance on these books. We’re going to do awesome things together, I guarantee it.

To read a fascinating interview with Dave on this subject and a whole lot more, visit the following link: http://davidgaughran.wordpress.com/2013/02/28/from-pizza-hut-to-easy-street-the-david-dalglish-story/

Interview with David McAfee

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The following interview with author David McAfee was conducted over the span of 4 days via email. David is the author of five books - 33AD, Saying Goodbye to the Sun, Grubs, The Lake and 17 Other Stories, and A Pound of Flash. You can read more about Mr. McAfee by visiting his website, McAfee Land.

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Journal Of Always: Hello, Mr. McAfee, and welcome to the Journal! I'd like to start off by asking you to expound a bit on your journey into the realm of independent publishing. Was this a decision that came about easily, or were you hesitant? Was there a specific event that directly led to you going this route?

David McAfee: Depends on the timeframe you are asking. It was a difficult decision to start self publishing, but once I did it became an easy decision to keep doing it. I toiled for years trying to land an agent or a publisher with zero success, but with the new ease of ePublishing, I discovered I don’t need either anymore. Not that I wouldn’t accept a contract from a big publisher, mind you, but I’m much happier letting my work roam the internet and bring in readers than I was when the only people who read it were friends and family.

There were a lot of events that added up to make me self publish, but the straw that broke the camel’s back came when Ghostwriter Publications decided they didn’t have to pay me for any of my work, regardless of contract. I don’t want to go into specifics here, because it would take up thirty pages or so, but anyone interested in knowing the whole story can read all about Ghostwriter and my experience with them on my blog, mcafeeland.wordpress.com. After that fiasco, I decided I was better off doing things myself, and so far I’ve been right.

JOA: What advice would you give writers who are considering going this route?

DM: First, make sure you have a quality product. By that I mean, don't slap together a story and say, "This is good enough," and then shove it online. Believe me, if it's a first draft, it ISN'T good enough. Part of the problem is people don't want to wait. They want their work out there earning money and fame and accolades NOW. But if you care at all about the quality of your work, then give your story the patience it deserves. Write it. Then edit it. Then edit it again. Then again. And again. Then send it to beta readers for their opinions. Then revise the book again.

Sound like a lot of work? It is. But work is how you get better. It's how you improve your craft. And it's how you win over readers. If you don't care enough about your book to put in the work, why should readers care enough about it to read it when you release it? So before you go and publish that masterpiece, make sure it's as good as it can possibly be, then edit it again and make it better. :)

JOA: I agree completely. I've heard many a writer complain about the editing process, but it is entirely necessary for the construction of a solid piece of literature.

On that note, there is a stigma in the publishing world that self-published novels are "below standard". What do you think we, as independents, can do to help change that image? Do you see the problem as being one of holding on to old prejudices in this new age of marketing, or are we as authors to blame?

DM: Absolutely. There is definitely a stigma against indie (or self-published) authors in the reading community. I'm not going to win a lot of points for saying this, but it's not entirely undeserved, either. Like I said above, one of the things that people should do before self-publishing is to make sure they are bringing a quality work to the marketplace. LOTS of indies do not do that, or they don't do enough to ensure their work is on par with the work of some of the traditionally published authors. Oh, you hear a lot of arguments like "Well, Dan Brown sucks as a writer and he's huge," or "I find typos in traditionally published books all the time." And both of those may be true (depending on your opinion of Dan Brown - personally I think he's awesome!), but it's NO EXCUSE. And when people delude themselves into thinking that publishing work that has been improperly edited and revised is all right, well, that's where the stigma comes from.

To be fair, there is a LOT of quality indie fiction out there, written by authors who actually want to succeed and who care about what their readers think of their work. But there is also a lot of crap, and the readers are the ones who have to wade through that crap to find the good books. That is there the stigma comes from, and the only way to eliminate it is for more people to take their craft seriously. I'm getting preachy here and I don't mean to, but I could literally spend hours talking about this one topic.

JOA: The way others approach writing intrigues me. What is your process, from inception to final product? Do you outline, or let the story roam free?

DM: I usually start with an idea and go from there. I’ve never outlined anything, preferring to let the story evolve on its own. In that way I’m often surprised by directions the characters take when I write. For example, there is a character in 33 A.D. that turns traitor. That wasn’t planned. I had no idea it was going to happen. I was just writing the scene and when it came to the end the character surprised me by doing something he shouldn’t have done. If I’d been working from an outline, I don’t think that would have occurred. That's the type of thing that makes writing fun to me.

JOA: I've read and reviewed 33AD, and found it to be a fantastic read. (read the review here) The storyline is original, and also, dare I say, a bit brave. To take the story of the crucifixion (or any religious event) and use it as a backdrop for a work of fiction is walking a bit of a metaphysical tightrope. You open yourself up to criticism from both sides of the fence. What was your inspiration for the story? Did you in any way want to say something profound, or just tell an entertaining story?

DM: Thank you. I was thrilled that you enjoyed it.

I read a book back in 2007 called Violent Sands, by Sean Young. Violent Sands takes place in Biblical Jerusalem and follows the activities of Barabbas, about whom little is mentioned. Young's work was so thoroghly researched and so brilliantly well written that it took me back in time to those dusty streets. I could see everything, smell everything, and hear the constant din of Passover in first century Jerusalem.

Of course, I found myself wondering what the vampires of the day might have thought of all the hooplah surrounding the young rabbi from Galilee, and that's how the idea came about. The rough draft took me 5 weeks to write, and two years to fine tune into the book it is today. :)

I really wasn't trying to do anything more than tell a story, but quite a few people have told me they found something of import within the texts of 33 A.D. I'd love to say that is intentional, but it isn't. In my case, I think if there is anything profound to be gleaned from the story it is less a case of masterful authorship and more a case of art imitating life. To put it simply, I'm just not that clever. :)

JOA: The response to 33 AD has been overwhelmingly positive. Many are screaming for a sequel. Is there one in the works?

DM: Yes, there is. I am about 1/3 of the way through the rough draft. I had hoped to have the rough draft completed by now, but my wife and I are expecting our first child. Add those new duties to my 50 hour a week day job and the fact that the Holidays have once again crept up on us with all the stealth of a panther, and you can see how much time gets eaten up with non writing things. However, I AM working on it, and I hope to have it out to my readers no later than this spring.

JOA: You have four other books - Saying Goodbye to the Sun, Grubs, The Lake and 17 Other Stories, and A Pound of Flash. Please tell us a little about each and why we should care about them.

DM: Saying Goodbye to the Sun will always be my baby. 33 A.D. gets all the attention and all the reviews, and it is a fine book, but SGTTS was my first novel. That will always have a special place in my heart. I started writing it in 1997, when I was in a very dark place in my personal life, and it became a type of therapy. I did everything I could in that book to break the main character, Vincent, and twist him into my vision of what a vampire should be. I think I did a pretty good job.

GRUBS was written as a short pulpy horror piece for my former publisher, who requested just that sort of work. I'd never done anything like it before, and I wasn't sure that I could. But once I got the ball rolling, it was a lot of fun. I mean, come on...mind-bending grubs that turn the dead into walking servants and the living into slaves? Guts and gore splattered on almost every page with a bizarre love triangle and a sick, twisted pervert thrown into the mix? Who could resist? GRUBS is a fun, quick read that doesn't try to be anything more than entertainment. If you're looking for deeper meaning, you might wanna look somewhere else. But if you're looking to get lost in the woods of northern Maine and be chased by nightmares that only a very unstable mind could create, then GRUBS is for you. I can't give any better endorsement than this: Amanda Hocking liked it. A lot. 'Nuff said. :)

The Lake and 17 Other Stories, as well as its follow up A Pound Of Flash, are short collections of horror fiction that I put out for 99 cents as kind of an intro to my work. Some of the stories are sick and twisted, some are gory, some are funny, and some are just plain odd, but all of them are fun. As a bonus, each features guest stories by some of my indie friends like David Dalglish , Daniel Arenson and Mike Crane. Good stuff in there, and definitely worth the price of admission. One last note on these is they contain quite a few pieces of microfiction. These are horror stories that are told in exactly 100 words – not 99, not 101, but 100, including the title. I can't begin to tell you what a challenge it is to compose a complete story in only 100 words, but it's brutal. Word choice is everything! They were so much fun to write that I'm thinking of doing a third collection, just because I enjoy them. I also enjoy showing off just how warped my mind can get.

JOA: You say your mind's warped, eh? What's the craziest idea you've ever had for a story - and was it ever written?

DM: Heh. I've had some pretty off the wall stories, and there are plenty that you will never know about. :) The weirdest one that I'll publicly admit to involved a former SS Officer who traveled back in time to assassinate Hitler but didn't make it because he was bitten by a poisonous snake. Turned out the snake was planted by a group of profiteering gun runners who didn't want Hitler killed because they were making too much money off the war. there migh have been a few paranormal elements, like a ghost Captain who tried to warn the officer and possibly even a time traveling vampire Nazi that let the gun runners know what was going on, but I won't say for sure. Told ya it was odd. And nope. I never even bothered to write it down.

JOA: You've made no secret you're a huge Cowboys fan, David. How do you explain the fact they haven't won a playoff game in almost 17 years?

DM: I am a HUGE Dallas Cowboys fan. Even when they are doing poorly I still wear my Cowboys gear every chance I get. I have autographs, figures, pictures, shirts, bags, ticket stubs, helmets, and a million other items of Dallas Cowboy love cluttering my house. My wife says I'm obsessed, but I'm not so sure...

But what team are YOU talking about? It can't be the Dallas Cowboys, who won the Wild Card round of the playoffs just last year by stomping the crap out of the Philadelphia Eagles. 17 years? Try last season, Rob. ;)

JOA: Oh, jeez. My bad. That’s a little embarrassing. I think I'm looking at the world through my Pats-colored glasses and ignoring everything else. That being said, sports opinion time! I loved watching Barry Sanders run the ball. Every handoff was an event. What football player - any team - have you enjoyed watching most over the years?

DM: *sigh* you had to ask. You are going to make me admit a deep, dark secret, Rob. I LOVED watching Emmit Smith play. mostly because he was on the Cowboys, I'll admit. And I really enjoy Tony Romo's game when he's hot, not so much when he's cold. But if I'm being honest, in terms of sheer excitement and how much (grudging) fun it is to watch an individual player, I have to admit that Tom Brady is easily the most exciting player I've ever seen play the game, and that's coming from a Brady hater. I don't like him at all, but Dear God that man can play. Pisses me off.

JOA: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview, David. It's much appreciated.

DM: No problem, Rob. Thanks for having me back. It's always a good time.

Review - Erich's Plea by Tracey Alley

Rating: 2.2 out of 5

Reviewing can be a frustrating game.

You dive into a book. You want to love it. You get to know the author, and they’re a super-nice person. And yet sometimes the reading experience lags behind your expectations. You don’t want to be mean, but you owe it to everyone – yourself, your readers, hell even the writer themselves – to be honest.

That’s where I found myself with Erich’s Plea by Tracey Alley.

In its premise, the book is hopeful. Slade, the son of a king, has abdicated his rights to the throne in order to become a druid. He is eventually thrown in prison for nefarious reasons. He dreams of his father, who’s been captured (or killed), and is left instructions on how he should go about plotting his escape. He eventually does, with the help of the typical rogue’s galley of fantasy characters. And in the background of all this, there is the intrigue of a plot to take over the world by a singular dark entity with seemingly unlimited power.

There were a few problems I ran into with the story. First of all, for a main character, Slade is, honestly, not very interesting. He has no charisma, no charm. It’s almost as if he’s simply there. Secondly, the majority of the plot revolves around the big prison escape, which like Slade isn’t very exciting. The reading is quick, but the action scenes are lacking. The head-hopping between characters can be confusing, and the characters themselves are oftentimes clichéd. There reached a point where I wanted to say, “all right, get out of the prison already!” It drags on through the length of the novel, and I begged this particular storyline to end.

This is where I come to the most frustrating aspect of all in this book. Whereas the main story arc, the prison break, is mundane and tiresome, the peripheral occurrences show so much promise, so much thought. The main protagonist in these (too short) sections is Lord Michael Strong. He, along with the grand wizard (or necromancer – I couldn’t figure out which exactly) Lord Nexus are having clandestine meetings to figure out ways in which they can reunite the different kingdoms that always seem to be at odds with each other, under the poisonous eyes of The Dark One, the seemingly all-powerful evil presence.

Through their conversations, Lords Michael and Nexus reveal the history of the world author Alley has built, and it is wonderful. It is a mirror to our own, in which the xenophobia and racism that exists between the warring factions brings down what had the potential to be an almost utopian society. I greatly appreciated these aspects of the book, along with the descriptions of the different types of magic. I found these threads to be original and inventive, and well worth expanding upon.

However, the author doesn’t, and instead we’re thrust back into the boring escape plan.

There’s something else amiss with the work, however, and this has everything to do with The Dark One, himself. He’s painted as an omnipresent figure, one who knows everything that happens around him, who is tyrannical in his rule. And yet we meet him, face-to-face (first mistake), and he’s more like a caricature than a well-fleshed-out villain. Also, for someone so all-powerful, he’s surrounded by spies (second mistake). This lessens his effectiveness and turns the character into a joke. How could such a dominant being with the power of mind-reading and witchcraft at his disposal not know all these characters in his tight inner circle are plotting against him? It simply doesn’t make sense and, although this is strange to say about a work of fantasy, makes the story much less believable.

The writing style the author uses is brisk, but there is something off about it, as well. The comma usage is all over the place. Many of the sentences are run-ons. There is information that is contradictory or unnecessary to the action. Here are a couple prime examples:

As it always did, on those rare occasions that Luca came to this section of the prison, he found the utter silence unnerving, although, at least it masked the screams of the prisoners.

They could all do with some better supplies Slade knew, apart from Lara, Tares and Darzan, who appeared fully equipped, the rest of them carried only arms and equipment purloined from the dead guards.

(Perhaps these represent differences between Australian and American English...I'm not entirely sure)

Not only this, but the author has a tendency to repeat names over and over and over again when a simple “he” or “she” would suffice. This is distracting and more than a little bit maddening, as well.

And yet, all this aside, I would probably read another of Alley’s work if given the opportunity. She does have a playfulness to her tone that I find intriguing. Some of her characters are inventive and break their tropes. She has a good head for societal themes and world-building. It’s simply not present in this book as much as it should be.

I know there are more novels the series. Perhaps she has matured as a writer since this one was written, perhaps not. But if it doesn’t improve, that would be it for me.

As for Erich’s Plea…I found it middling, at best.

Plot - 3

Characters - 5

Voice - 5

Execution - 4

Personal Enjoyment – 5

Overall – 22/50 (2.2/5)

Available at Amazon.com:

Ebook for Kindle

Paperback

Review: The Quest for Nobility, Book 1 (The Rule of Otharia series) by Debra L Martin and David W. Small

Rating: 2.5 out of 5

Sometimes, when reading a series, the first installment is all about the buildup, of setting the tone and the world in which the rest of the tale can take place. I know this, because when writing my own series, The Rift, I realized that the first book had almost nothing to do with the next three. Often times, the writing is poles apart from what you find later, as the author grows into his or her (or, in this case, both) style. I say this not meaning the story or the method is bad by any means. But it can be a little irritating.

Thus mentioned, I bring you The Quest for Nobility, book one of The Rule of Otharia series by the writing team of Debra L. Martin and David W. Small.

This is purported to be a science fiction novel. It is, in a way, seeing as much of the action takes place on the aforementioned planet of Otharia. The people on this planet, however, look and act very similarly to you or I (with a couple important differences), and their culture is fashioned after what one might find in sixteenth-century Europe, what with barons, dukes, duchies, a lack of many of the technologies we see everyday, and whatnot. In this way, the book steers far away from science fiction and enters the realm of fantasy. If not for portals opening up to modern-day Earth, one could forget they were on another planet at all.

Most people on this planet are gifted with the three major classifications of psychic abilities: empathy, telekinesis, and telepathy. The society’s royals hone their gifts at institutions, while the layfolk are resigned to letting theirs stagnate. This is typical of caste societies – those in power are afforded every opportunity imaginable, while those on the lower end of the spectrum are not.

Despite their reliance on a ruling class, on Otharia it seems that there has not been a king in many, many years. Now, the ruling dukes have formed what they call The Grand Council, a parliament of sorts. It is this council that votes on all the major decisions that affect the different duchies. It is because of this voting system that there has not been a king in such a long time, which is something that Grand Duke Vodgor is intent on changing. He plots various nefarious schemes, forming an underground political entity, fixing competitions, and clandestinely killing off any rival dukes and duchesses who oppose him (with the help of his deliciously evil psychic assassin Nils), in hopes of somehow convincing the council to appoint him king.

It is during the time these plots are taking place that we meet the three main characters of the story – Dyla and Darius Telkur, twins set to rule after the murder of their parents, and Eclasius Jortac, son of a rival duke. These three, after some problems early on in their relationships, bind themselves together to win the Grand Competition, a yearly competition, in hopes that the money won will save the Telkur duchy.

Things go wrong, very wrong, when they win. A rival team is murdered and Vogdo’s underground group is set to blame the twins for their deaths. Because of this, they are forced to flee, and they decided to go to – you guessed it – Earth. Here they have a few misadventures, meet up with an expert on Stonehenge, and figure out that there seems to be a connection between Otharia and Earth that they hadn’t expected.

All right, enough about the plot. It’s time for some exposition on my part.

I honestly found this book maddening at times, even though it interested me throughout. The dialogue is choppy and robotic, the characters seem too perfect to root for, and there are some seemingly major holes in the timeline. Also, as some might note, it is written in third person omniscient, my disdain of which I have been quite open about. I feel like I must explain this, however. It’s not like I oppose to the use of this point of view; on the contrary, I find it quite entertaining, when done right. There is a quaint beauty to it. The problem is it’s one of the hardest viewpoints to construct correctly in the first place. The writer needs to handle segues between different characters’ thoughts with a certain delicacy that difficult to both explain and execute. I’ve read some that are done well and loved them. If I’m gong to be truthful here, these authors don’t.

As for the timeline gaps: I say this because the order of events seems skewed. When Darius, Dyla, and Eclasius head off to Earth, they are there for four days, five max. However, back on Otharia, it seems as if weeks or even months have passed. This might just have been me missing something, but it still riled me.

I don’t want to be all negative, and I won’t be, because there were many good things about the book, as well. It’s set up in a quirky and fun way, with a segment from various informative texts preceding each chapter as a way of explaining how the rules of this world work. I found these to be among the most interesting components of the book, as they disclose their information in a just-the-facts way. It is a departure from the style of the rest of the book, and it makes these sections stand out, which is a very good thing. The dissimilarities between the Otharians and Earthlings are intriguing, as well. They are painted as superior, in a way, and humans as paranoid deviants. However, we can plainly see through the way the people of Otharia are constantly (and easily) misled that there is something to be said for the paranoia we, as a people, possess. I don’t know if this was an intended statement by the authors, but I very much appreciated it.

Also, the storyline itself is intriguing. I don’t want to give too much away here, but there are links between the planet Otharia and Arthurian legend that make me say, “Yes, please, more.” The end is fantastic, when all the threads that run through the tale are uncovered, and this makes the whole journey – even the irksome parts – worth it. There is potential for the stories down the line that could make this a special experience, and it is with this fact in mind that I say the following…

When thinking about what to rate this book, I gave it two-and-a-half stars. However, I didn’t stop reading until the book was done, and it did stay with me for long after I put it down. That, in itself, is a feat. So I decided to download the sample of book two, titled The Crystal Façade. I’m glad I did. The writing in the second book is ramped up more than a few notches. The story flows much easier. In other words, it looks to be very well constructed. Based on this fact, I say no one should give up on this series. After all, as I said in the beginning, this is an introductory novel. Even Harry Potter was a bit below par in the first couple books, but by the end of the series, it was all made worthwhile.

I have a feeling this particular chain of books could be, as well.

The Quest for Nobility - Kindle edition

Plot - 8

Characters - 5

Voice - 4

Execution - 4

Personal Enjoyment - 4

Overall - 25/50 (2.5/5)

Digging Up Donald

"Did you throw open the doors of Heaven to one and all?"
"Don't be daft, it would fill up with Christians. What would Heaven be if there were Christians everywhere? We'd all have to watch our language."


On Fridays, the public library in town closes down early. There will be no checking out books after 5 PM. That means by the time I get out of work that day, the lot is empty and the doors are closed.

I say this because I have become a ravenous reader, going through books the way junkies go through their latest score. I rely on these forays into fantasy to, as I’ve said before, both build my own craft and escape the doldrums of a monotonously busy work week. In other words, finishing a novel on a Friday, if I have no new purchases handy, will leave me high and dry for the weekend and reduce me to perusing my ever-growing bookshelf at home for some retread reading material.

Recently, this very circumstance occurred, and I happened to pick up a book a friend of mine had written back in 2004 titled Digging Up Donald. I shrugged, grabbed it off the shelf, and read it for the first time in four years, when Steven Pirie, my friend and fellow author, sent me ten copies to sell at an international art exhibit that Artwiffy hosted back in ’05.

Boy, am I glad I did, because for a second read, this one blew me away. It is such a fantastic book, filled to the point of spilling over with horror, comedy, and mostly coming-of-age wisdom. The tone is wry and distinctly British, and anyone who ever enjoyed an episode of Monty Python or Black Adder – or maybe even Twin Peaks - will eat this up. I don’t know why I didn’t rave like this back when I first passed my eyes over the sentence, “It was biscuits at ten paces”, four years ago, because I knew even then that I loved it. Perhaps I wasn’t at a place in my life where I could fully appreciate it; or maybe I couldn’t find the proper words and confidence in those words to express myself accurately. Either case, that time is past, and now I am here to sing, baby, sing.

Digging Up Donald is the story of a family in the small English town of Mudcaster, a place that stands on the brink (and frontlines) of Armageddon. Demons have infiltrated the town, you see, and are planning a war that only the Family can stop – with the help of the peculiar and wholly original Donald, of course, for whom the book is named. There are quite a few funny instances where Mother and Father plan to get down and dirty with the whole business, all the while keeping true to their quaint, small-town British sensibilities. The situation with their daughter, Maureen, who is faced with losing something every woman of child rearing age fears, is played out tongue-in-cheek, and her relationship with her sheepish husband Brian is developed with a maestro’s display of wit and sexual metaphor. The townspeople, each of whom is distinct, add more than the story’s backdrop; they’re just as vital to the plot and feel as any of the major characters, which include, among others, the family’s quirky (and deceased) Uncle Norman and a wily, disembodied brain predisposed to acts of extreme violence.

As I said earlier, however, this is a coming-of-age story as much as anything, and to this point the central character is Robert, Mother and Father’s youngest child. His passage to adulthood is marked with the generalities usually ascribed to such tales – responsibility, exploration, loss, young love – only presented in an original and heartwarming fashion. Robert’s romance with Joan, the daughter of the Reverend Likewise (who might not be what he seems) is both sweet and filled with youthful daring, and proves to be a central cog in the resolution of the conflict. To juxtapose this, his rapport with The Grandmother (another shrewdly crafted character) surveys the duplicitous discord-versus-culture inherent with the coexistence of the older and younger generations. Their scenes together are painted with brutal honesty, yet there is a definite tenderness there when you peel away the outer layers.

The underworld is another thing of beauty, created out of a familiar mold and then flipped, upside-down, on the plate of pages. Wait until you see the rapport between the souls here, both lost and found. It’s sure to have you both rolling on the floor laughing and scratching you chin, saying, “huh, that makes sense.”

As a tale of the never-ending battle between good and evil, Digging Up Donald doesn’t forget to present the idea that, even in this fantasy world, not everything can (or should) be lathered in extreme shades of black and white. God is an overbearing father who seemingly doesn’t care too much about what goes on beyond his own gates, and the devil character is very polite with an irresistible swashbuckling charm. The demons are things we can loathe, laugh at, and feel sorry for, all at the same time. It also offers what I find to be a brilliant proposal; that this supposedly unending battle goes on for no other reason than the fact the particulars, the powers-that-be, aren’t forward thinking enough to realize there could be an end, presenting the immortals of both the upper and lower realms as creatures locked in a stubbornly ignorant perception of history.

Needless to say, this is one of the most intelligent, earnest, and hilarious books I’ve ever read. I’m not speaking (er, writing) in superlatives here. The only other novel I’ve completed which it compares to is Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins. I definitely recommend this to any and all audiences. Pick it up, and you won’t want to put it down until you’re finished.

Yes, gentle readers, it is that good.

You can purchase a copy of Digging Up Donald here.

Idleness in Art

Just a quick little tangent for today.

As a writer, sometimes the effort it takes to construct sentences and paragraphs that fall into line with the whole of a certain creation can bring with it a sort of fatigued laziness; a mental state through which inaction, at the time, might seem more productive than putting thoughts down on paper you just know won’t do the job. I fight with this often – there are hours that I sit there in front of the laptop, staring at the screen, typing the first few letters of a word only to delete them immediately. This can go on for hours, until I finally slam the cover shut and go about the rest of my day’s business.

I’ve often asked myself…is there any way to avoid these situations?Yes.

The conclusion I’ve found is that there’s no such thing as wasted words. Even a passage that will inevitably wind up in the recycle bin is a worthwhile endeavor. Creation is all about trial and error, of mistakes and changes of thought. Jessica Torrant (from here on known as ArtWiffy) has taught me this. Watching her lather a canvas with paint, stare at it sideways for a moment, and then throw another layer on top of what she’s just finished, all the while with this odd expression on her face that might seem to be a smile if not for the intensity brimming right below the surface, has been an inspiration. No longer can I sit idle and feel sorry for my lack of inspiration. The only muse I need is right here (taps on temple). It’s from within that art springs forth and, just like everything else in life, the mistakes mean just as much as the finished project. After all, there wouldn’t be a finished project if not for those mistakes. It’s all a part of the process.

So thank you, ArtWiffy, for giving me that knowledge. No more meandering. This one's for you.