Sunborn and Phidelphius

Concept art of Daniels for Sunborn. By Michael Rubi

So my third novel, Phidelphius, is done. Finished typing it up a few days ago. I've started the first round of edits on it, and once I'm done with those I'll send it off to my beta readers (friends and family who offer to read the rough copy, and then they let me know what they think). And after that I'll hand it off to my writing buddies for a free edit, and hopefully within a couple months from there it'll be available for anyone who would like to read it.

Now, before Phidelphius can be released, I have to do the same with Sunborn, which is the the book Phidelpius is a sequel to. Sunborn's about a guy named Daniels who's basically invincible in the day, but literally rots at night. He lives in a post-apocolyptic world that's covered in ice and water, and he's the last man on earth, or least that's what he thinks until he stumbles upon another civilization that's at war with an advanced city that lives underground. So this guy's been done for awhile. I've just been waiting for Bad Dreams to make back some money before I bought a cover and had it edited. Bad Dreams has made back enough now that I could have Sunborn produced now if I wanted, but I'm getting some great content edits (story edits) from my writing buddies that are really improving the book, so I'm holding out. The only problem is that my writing buddies are day-time teachers (as am I), so it's just taking way too long. If we kept at it at the same rate we've been going it would take 3 more months before we'd finish the book (and we've been doing it for a couple months already). I've decided to shrink the text and spacing of my document (one of my buddies did this with his book, though it was unintentional) to cram more words per page so we can get this guy done in a month or so. I don't know why I didn't think to do this sooner. My partners won't care, and in fact they may end up liking the book better. I find that I question the author's motives for telling me or not telling me things much less when I can turn the page and have my questions answered, rather than having to scribble "What the fuck, man?" in the margins. Hopefully my friends share this sentiment.

Indie Confession — #2

So I met with my author group today. We meet every two weeks, me and a couple of writer friends. We swap 20 pages of our most recent completed manuscript and pass back the 20 pages we swapped from the week before that now have our scribbles all over them. We tell each other our work is shit, and we fluff each other a little bit as well, building each other while tearing down; being honest. It's one of the most constructive things I do as a writer—other than writing, of course. It really helps with the isolation of writing as well. There's a lot of dark times when you're writing a novel. You reach a certain point with every book where you're afraid the whole thing may be complete shit, or at least what you're writing now may be complete shit, the other stuff was good, but everything you're writing now is just ruining it. But you plow through, because that's what everyone says to do. You finish the book. You think it might suck, maybe it's good, who the hell knows. Let's write another one. Something different. And then a couple weeks go buy and you read that book you wrote and it's not bad. In fact you think it might be the best thing you've ever written. So you see how it's hard to trust yourself here when it comes to determining if what you wrote is really worth reading, or if it needs work. You have no fucking idea if it's good or not. You only know it's better written than that last thing you did. You can see that. But everything else, who knows?

That's how it is for me anyways. There's a lot of inner thoughts that go on before and after the writing, more than go on while I write. There's a flow that takes place during the actual process of writing, and all the insecurities don't mean a damn thing. The story builds, it bends, and then eventually, it ends. I'm fortunate to have people that read them. And even more fortunate to have people who read them after those people have read them, and some where in there people pay to read them, I'd like to especially thank that last group, and that first group, but no offense Kyle, I'm going to thank the last group just a little bit more.

Overall, I feel pretty fortunate. I'm looking forward to publishing more in the near future. At the rate of our current meets Sunborn will finish its peer edit in 3.75 months, which is over my projected (desired) date, but I think I may be able to nudge my critique partners to push a little toward the end of our run on these manuscripts (Kyle's been slipping in more words per page...oh Kyle, you dog!). But the book is worth the wait. The advice and comments I'm getting from these guys is invaluable, and I can't wait to share what we've created with you. 

Breathing

Today marked the end of the longest planned break I've taken from writing Sunborn II (Sunborn 1 to be released in a month or two). I started writing this book in November as part of the NaNoWrImO project that a lot of authors participate in. I knew I couldn't write my book in a month, but figured why not write as much as I can, as often as I can and see where we are. I wrote about 10,000 words in November and since then I've typed up 44,000. The goal is somewhere around 70k, but I'll stop when the story's done, whether that's before or after 70k. But I noticed today that it took me a lot longer to jump back into writing the story. I first looked over the notes of things I want to happen (these are written on paper in multiple spiral notebooks, and on a small notepad) and then I read through the last two chapters I'd written. And since this is a sequel, I read through some of the original book for some details that carried over to the sequel I was unsure of. So I spent a lot of my writing time today not even writing, I was reading. For me that's a huge part of the process.

I'm not sure I could write a book without taking breaks. I mean, I'm sure I could write, but I'm not sure it would be worth reading. There's a certain fatigue that happens to me when I do the same thing over and over again for so long, and writing a novel is no exception. That's why I have so many short stories. I wrote most of them while I was writing Bad Dreams and Sunborn. They were part of my breaks from writing the same story. During my most recent break I chose to simply relax. To do no writing, and instead I read a book and watched some good television and a movie. I think this is as equally important as writing. If you're not experiencing stories written by other people, than how are you going to grow? I know we grow by doing, but we need to witness what can be done. We need to see the great art that others have created to inspire us to try to achieve those same heights, and in some cases try to surpass them. 

Breaks are also a great time to just think about the problem and how you can solve it. Another reason I wanted to take a break is because I've managed to climb over the halfway mark of my novel and I can feel the ending coming in. I'm not ready for it, I feel the book needs more, and of course as you get close to the end, you have to figure out how your loose ends are going to get tied up. So I wanted to mull these things over, figure out if the book was truly near it's end, and also, I needed to know what happened next. That simple question that every author asks themselves at some point, that was also a problem. Because I knew the big things, and I knew the basic conclusion that's coming, but I didn't know what the exact next thing would be, so that was added to my list of things to mull over.

So my break ended today. I typed up 1,436 words, which isn't a lot for me, but they were quality words, which I care a lot more about than hitting arbitrary numbers. And I've answered a lot of those questions I had, and I feel like the stories headed in the right direction toward an ending I hope will not only be satisfying, but emotionally fulfilling. Because if I haven't made you feel an emotion, than I think I've failed. Here's crossing my fingers I get a tear or two. Or maybe just a smile. We'll see.

Skeletons Free and On Tour

Today I'm offering Skeletons for free on Amazon. So if you haven't had a chance to check out my collection of dark short stories you can download it for free today and read it any time you like. This is not a borrow, but is considered a sale, and will be on your device for as long as you wish it to be. Click HERE to get your copy.

I'm also doing a blog tour with Skeletons, I'll be on the blog Tea Talks today where Helen Treharne will be reviewing my book and I'll be answering questions in the comments, so if you'd like to add to the discussion, or just observe, drop on by.

Here's a complete list of the blog tour:

January 16: Tea Talks
January 23: Romorror Fan Girl
January 30: StarAngels Reviews
January 30: Carpe_Diem
February 6: fuonlyknew ~ Laura's Ramblins and Reviews
February 6: Not Now...Mommy's Reading

Indie Confession — #1

Hey guys! Sorry it's been a bit since my last indie confession, but you know, the holidays and all that. But hey, things are going pretty well around here. Bad Dreams is performing well on Kindle Unlimited  (which is Amazon's version of Netflix for books. You pay a monthly fee and have unlimited access to all Amazon exclusive reads)—I'm also selling copies of it on a daily basis, so I'm very happy about that, so thank you readers!—um let's see, what else is going on? Had a great meeting with my author friends today, very thankful to have those guys to sharpen my writing and can't wait to release my next series that we're going over in the group, very excited to get Sunborn  out there, I think you guys are going to love it! I'm doing a lot of giveaways on Goodreads, so if you aren't a friend or fan of me on there you should click HERE if you're interested in keeping up with the paperback book giveaways I'm doing on there. I've done three so far, and I'll be continuing them throughout the year as new titles are released, and will periodically give away copies of my current titles.

So those are the nutshell things that have been going on in the world of Polar Bear Books. I'd like to now transition into a list of my company's 2015 release plans and writing goals. 

Polar Bear Books 2015 Release Plans and Writing Goals

• Late Winter—Early Spring: Release book 1 in sci-fi adventure series,  Sunborn.
• Late Spring: Complete writing on first draft of book 2 in the Sunborn series. Book 2 is currently 27,000 words in.
• Summer: Begin writing Dick and Henry: The Novel (official title to be announced). Release completed novel by summer's end.
• Late Summer—Early Fall: Develop story for book 3 in Sunborn series and book 2 in Dick and Henry Series.

Well, those are my goals for the coming year. I'm sure I'll modify them as needed, but those are currently the titles I expect to have released by the listed times. I secretly hope to have developed a title or two that are not connected to any of my existing series somewhere in between those other works, we'll just have to see where the year takes us. 

As always, thanks for reading. See you next time.

Dick and Henry: Cover Reveal

Well, it's been a great year. I've released two books, one a collection of dark sci-fi and fantasy short stories, the other, a novel, about a  bullied boy who creates nightmares in hell.  And next year we're going to kick it off here at Polar Bear Books with a new series, Dick and Henry. Dick and Henry: The Space Saga  is a short story collection that features a space pilot and his company assigned robot who travel the galaxy, solving mysteries. This book will lead directly into a full length novel! So start the story at the beginning with Dick and Henry: The Space Saga. 

Coming January 6th.

A Giveaway, A New Book, And Future Titles

All right, all right, all right, 2014 is trucking along, we're in the middle of December, couple more weeks and it'll be January, and then it'll be time for me to release a new book (Dick and Henry: The Space Saga, read a story from the collection HERE). And then a couple months after that it'll be time for me to release Sunborn, my sci-fi epic. I know I've stated previously that it would be released in January, but after some hard thought, I've decided to push back the release so I can get a quality content edit from my peers before I send it off to Jason for the final edit. The cover will be created by Maciej Wojtala, the guys done some great work for me already for Dick and Henry: The Space Saga, and I look forward to revealing that cover to you guys next month.

Well, I guess that's all I really had for this post...wait a minute, I forgot to mention the Goodreads giveaway I'm doing. You can enter HERE to win a print copy of Skeletons, my short story collection of dark sci-fi and horror stories. The giveaway ends January 3rd, so make sure you enter soon before the books are gone!

In The Footsteps of Greats

Learning from the past. We all do that, right? No matter what our profession. You could be a teacher, a doctor, an auto mechanic, doesn’t matter. You’re as good as you are because of the people before you. That’s assuming you’re a professional. Maybe you just do this for fun. You like to mess around in the woodshop on weekends, or maybe you just like to tinker under your hood on your nights off, see if you can get more power. But what do you do when you stuck? Youtube? Google? We all study our craft, no matter what it is, no matter how Laissez fair we may be about it. We all learn from the greats. You think those guys you found on a random forum off of google aren’t really greats? They’re just pizza making enthusiast, not Johnny Di Francesco. Maybe you’re right. But who’s to say? Maybe Pete-zza really is one of the best modern chef’s, and he’s choosing to share his knowledge with you. Maybe he’s just a good pizza maker, and not great. Maybe, the whole idea of good and great are just bullshit abstract terms that have no bearing on what is actually good. That one seems like a bit of a stretch, but maybe it’s not really that far from the truth.

My point is, we all learn from what's come before. We build on our own personal greats. For me, for my writing career, the greats of the genres I write in are Asimov, PKD, and Doyle. The working greats who work in my industry are Hugh Howey, Johnny B. Truant, Sean Platt, and Joanna Penn. These are the people I watch and learn from, they’re the greats of my present, I study them as much as I study the greats of the past.

Who are your greats? Who inspires you? What drives you? My inspiration primarily comes from movies and novels. Stories told by other people. They’re what fuel me to be better. Seeing other great art makes me want to improve my own art. Makes me want to shine my writing, improve my prose, cut my bullshit and get to the story, the thing the reader came for. Which leads directly into what drives me. The need for improvement, for the next book to be better than the last, for the next story to be something that someone somewhere will want to read, and will want to read more of. That’s what pushes me to study my craft, to push out my words, and publish them for other eyes to see.

 Who are your greats? Everyone has one. Tell us yours.

2014-2015 Guide To Kenneth's Fiction

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So, I know I've been talking a lot about what's coming out in the near future, as far as books and story collections written by me, but I think that with the noise of the internet it probably hasn't rang that clear, so let me present you with the official guide to what's coming out by me in the next few months:

    Bad Dreams- (dark fantasy)

• Expected Release Date: Between late November and early December. 
• Plot Summary: Bad Dreams tells the story of Johnathon Clark, a bullied teenager who decides to take his own life. He finds himself in Hell, moving up from the position of mail boy, to the giver of nightmares; the bearer of bad dreams. Now John must decide if he will do the job he's been given, punishing the sinners he's been assigned, or if he will use his dark gift for something more? Will he use it to help a young girl who needs him?
• Reason For Delay: Had some issues with the cover design, but they've been addressed and the release will be coming very soon. 

    Sunborn- (science fiction)

• Release Date: January 5th. 
• Plot Summary: Have you ever felt alone in the world? Daniels feels that way, only it's not just a feeling, it's the simple truth. The planet has died around him, and he's all that's left in a world of ice and water. That is until something brings him to Decropolis: a city made of ice and filled with people—living people. Now Daniels must relearn how to interact with other human beings, and learn a whole new lessons in what mankind is capable of when all the rules have been broken. Can Daniels survive the war that's coming? A war brewing beneath the ground.

    Dick and Henry: The Space Saga-(science fiction)                

• Release Date: January 5th.

• Plot Summary: Dick Shannon is a transport pilot for the interplanetary corporation Micro Grocer. His job is to deliver fresh vegetables from MG harvest planets to MG silo stations. The job is interesting enough, it pays the bills, and leaves him with enough cash left over to save for the dream home back on planet Earth. The only problem is the company is damn cheap and refuses to hire outside help. Every time something goes wrong on a station or a harvest planet Dick seems to be in the neighborhood, and he and his harvest bot, HN-R3—who he refers to as Henry—are required to investigate the issue. Whether it be missing employees, a fallen tower, or a mysterious robot wedding, Dick and Henry are always there, and they're always doing their best to solve the case.

So that's what I have planned for the next few months. All of the above titles are written, and you can get a sample reading of one of Dick and Henry's adventures HERE. But just because I have several titles completed, doesn't mean I'm slowing production. I'm currently working on the sequel to Sunborn, and when finished with Sunborn II (actual title to be announced after the release of Sunborn) I will begin work on a Dick and Henry novel, to which the short story collection will lead directly into.

Feel free to sound off in the comments below, let me know which story sounds the most exciting to you, and what type of fiction you'd like to see me write in the future.

The War of Art: Review

It took me awhile to jump on the War of Art band wagon. I first heard about it when I was reading Johnny B. Truant and Sean Platt's how to be a self publisher book, Write.Publish.Repeat. In that book they mention Steven Pressfield's book quite a few times, so I thought, "maybe I'll get around to reading it." It wasn't until I saw Hugh Howey's post (the author of the best selling Wool series) that I decided I needed to read this thing. I have to say, I ended up liking it, if only after a week or two from when I finished it.

So let me start off by saying that I as I was reading The War of Art, I felt like I disagreed with a lot of what Pressfield was saying, or at least I felt that it wasn't really worth saying. Who care's if if the muse we get our ideas from are angels or if it's just a predisposed genetic trait that perhaps some of us have and others don't? (I disagree with both of these theories, instead believing all humans are capable of being story tellers, it's just practice that makes one good at it). The book is filled with philosophical debates like this, but I think most artists, or craftsman for that matter, don't worry about where their gift came from, they just use it and sharpen it to a point as they perfect their art. So that's the background noise that fills the book, but the front stuff, the stuff that's most important, is the parts of the book that talk about what Pressfield calls "resistance." Now this is the part of the book that later made me realize that I actually liked it. Here he's not blabbering about what is or isn't, he's referring to something every person on Earth has felt before. It's that feeling you get when you want to start your own business, but a voice in your head tells you, "That would never work." It's the voice that says, "You don't have enough self control to exercise regularly, don't even bother looking into the price of a gym membership." In short, resistance is the voice in everyone's head that tells them they're a failure, and that risk you're considering is never worth taking.

Resistance is an asshole, and this book tells you to not only ignore it, but to defy it. To trust that everyone feels this way, that every great before you, every person who ever lived their life the way they wanted to; they felt the same way. Oddly enough, these simple facts that seem self evident, when read from somebody elses voice, they sure do feel comforting. Especially when you're navigating the scary and often times lonely world of self publishing. I say lonely, even though I've had the great fortune of having many supportive friends and family who've assisted me on my path to self publishing, writing is still a solitary craft, and it doesn't take much for you to begin questioning if every word you've written in the last month has been a complete waste of your time, and even worse, if that's what everything you write will be from now on. These thoughts are just resistance, Pressfield knows this, and because of his book, The War of Art, now so do we. So if you're a writer, an illustrator, an athlete, or if your someone who's just looking to try something new, something that's scary and you're not sure you can talk yourself into it, pick up this book, it could be the thing that sparks your will, and overturns that voice of resistance growing in your head.

Skeletons and Kindle Select

I'm trying it out. For those of you who don't know, Kindle Select is an option Amazon gives it's contributors, where the contributor agrees to sell their book exclusively on Amazon for a period of 90 days. In exchange for exclusivity the author is given 5 days where he or she can offer their book for free and they offer a sales system, that they call Kindle Countdown Deals, where the author can lower the price of their book which features a timer letting the shopper know how long the book will be available for the reduced price. They also offer your book to Kindle Prime members as part of their library they can borrow from, which the author receives a royalty for.

Of course going Select has its pros and its cons. The pros being that these benefits are actually pretty good marketing tools when combined with outside ads, or marketing pushes. The cons are that your book is not available to the customers who only shop on Barnes and Noble, Kobo, or ibooks. The majority of sales on most authors titles do happen on Amazon, but not all sales happen there, and there have of course been cases of some authors books exploding on other sites, such as Barnes and Noble, while their sales have stayed stagnant on Amazon, that's not the norm, but it can happen.

These are the things I took into consideration when deciding to go select with my short story collection Skeletons. I believe, that for me, the benefits of Select out weigh the potential sales of other retailers. The reason I say this is simply because I am a new author on the scene, I'm still building credibility through sales and reviews, so not having my work on every platform doesn't hurt me the way it would hurt someone who already has an established audience, one that may include readers who only shop on retailers outside of Amazon. All future novels, at least for now, will be available on all platforms, but for now Skeletons will only be available on Amazon. 

Skeletons can be found for sale on Amazon by clicking HERE