Hi everyone.
A late update, I waited until tonight hoping that iTunes/iBooks would get Shattered Ties live sometime today. It looks like that isn't going to happen. The approval queue there generally takes about a week, sometimes a little less, sometimes a little more.
I loaded it up on Thursday or Friday of last week (I'm not positive which day as I'm a little punch drunk tonight). I figured that would give enough time to get it live before the release date as it was a little more than a week.
It turns out that wasn't enough time. There were a few issues on my side that led to this one not being loaded up as soon as it should have been, so I'm re-working the process on my side to make sure that I get subsequent books loaded up at least 2-3 weeks before the release date.
Shattered Ties is up now everywhere else (links below), but I'm very sorry for all of you Apple users who are going to have to wait for an extra few days. I'll do a new post as soon as it goes live as well as a tweet and a e-mail blast as soon as it goes live for you guys.
Amazon US
Amazon UK
Kobo
Barnes & Noble
Smashwords
Saturday, August 31, 2013
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
Dean has a forum!
Some of the more observant--or obsessive :) --may have already noticed the new link on the right side of the blog, but I just wanted to put up another quick update for you all to let you know that with some great help from an awesome fan in the Netherlands named Chris (thanks Chris!), I now have a forum up and running where any or all of you can hang out, connect with other fans, or ask me some of those insightful questions that I sometimes get via e-mail.
I've got a few iron's in the fire right now, so moderation and responses might be a little slower than ideal, but I'll try to at least check in once a day and say hi if there are any new posts.
As a teaser, I've put the 'Winter Escapes' short stories up there and I'm prepared to dole out a little more information about 'The Priest' if people ask the right kind of questions.
Thanks,
--Dean
I've got a few iron's in the fire right now, so moderation and responses might be a little slower than ideal, but I'll try to at least check in once a day and say hi if there are any new posts.
As a teaser, I've put the 'Winter Escapes' short stories up there and I'm prepared to dole out a little more information about 'The Priest' if people ask the right kind of questions.
Thanks,
--Dean
August Update
We're coming up on nearly a year of me writing full-time, which seemed like something that deserved a blog post, along with the semi-regular update that I'm past due getting out.
Since I quit the day job I've written seven books and published five books. I had two books partly finished before I quit, which means I've currently got 4 more books that are in my production pipeline and which will be published in the next six to eight months.
The first of those is the fourth Guadel Chronicles Book (Shattered Ties), which will be available at the temporarily discounted price of $3.99 (or your local equivalent) starting on the first of September.
The next book, which I'm hoping to get out in November is another Eldon Murphy Reflections (Geoffrey) book, this one featuring the daughter that nobody…well almost nobody, knew that he had. In the tradition of my Eldon Murphy books, this one will be a little more edgy than what I usually put in my Alec and Adri Reflections books. Nothing too bad still, more PG-13 heavy than PG-13 lite, but I still would rather warn people than have something catch them by surprise. In good news, I've already sent this one out to one of my awesome UK fans, Claire, to take a first look at it and she loved it. (Thanks Claire.)
The next book that will be released is my first Dark Reflections full novel, which will be told primarily from the point of view of Alec. I'm hoping for this one to go live sometime in December, after which the second Dark Reflections book (featuring Adri) should be released in Feb 2014.
From a purely business perspective it could be argued that I'm being really stupid to write anything other than Alec and Adri books right now. Trapped, Intrusion, and the Greater Darkness haven't sold anywhere nearly as well as the Alec and Adri books.
All I can figure is that a lot of readers see names other than Alec and Adri's in the blurbs and choose to skip those particular stories, which is a shame because I've received really good feedback on some of those stories and ultimately they are a big part of what goes into making the Reflections universe—Alec and Adri's story—more full and complex.
I'm probably preaching to the choir as it's mostly my most hardcore fans that are going to end up reading this, but I do hope that you'll pick up the new releases even when they aren't directly Alec and Adri books.
On several levels I feel like I had to write these two Dark Reflections book before I could continue on with Alec and Adri, just like I have to flesh out Geoffrey's story a little more before I can continue on with Jasmin and Ben's story.
Dark Reflections gives me a chance to explore other sides to characters we already know and love as well as showing the humanity of some of our favorite villains. Dark Reflections is an alternate timeline, a parallel universe, but it's tightly intertwined with the core Reflections story and it's going to offer a level of depth that I simply couldn't pull off any other way.
Dark Reflections is a story of what could have happened. It's a grimmer place than the Reflections timeline, but not everything is terrible. Like anything else it's a balance of good and bad, but more than anything else, it shows just how much impact the actions, even just the existence, of one person can have.
I can't tell you for sure yet what chapter of the story I'll pick up next. August is an 'off month' meaning that instead of writing I'm desperately trying to get through editing passes of the next Eldon Murphy book, the first Dark Reflections novel, and tie up loose ends for the release of Shattered Ties. If I have a few extra minutes in there I've got a whole slew of print books that need finished up, and a few other assorted projects.
In some ways the sheer breadth of the options I have to choose from is intimidating, especially as the separate storylines start to interact more with each other, but it's also incredibly exciting. I really think that this story is going to be something special. I'm not a good enough writer to write it all yet, but I can see how to get there and I do get a little better with each book.
I don't know if my books will ever have a movie made about them, or if millions of people will read these stories. It's possible that they will never make the kind of splash that I'd love to see them make, but regardless of how well or poorly they ultimately end up doing from a sales perspective, I really am grateful to have you all along for the ride, I'll try my absolute hardest to deliver on the potential of these books, both the Reflections series and the places I'm hoping to be able to go with Jain and Va'del's world.
Thanks again,
--Dean
Since I quit the day job I've written seven books and published five books. I had two books partly finished before I quit, which means I've currently got 4 more books that are in my production pipeline and which will be published in the next six to eight months.
The first of those is the fourth Guadel Chronicles Book (Shattered Ties), which will be available at the temporarily discounted price of $3.99 (or your local equivalent) starting on the first of September.
The next book, which I'm hoping to get out in November is another Eldon Murphy Reflections (Geoffrey) book, this one featuring the daughter that nobody…well almost nobody, knew that he had. In the tradition of my Eldon Murphy books, this one will be a little more edgy than what I usually put in my Alec and Adri Reflections books. Nothing too bad still, more PG-13 heavy than PG-13 lite, but I still would rather warn people than have something catch them by surprise. In good news, I've already sent this one out to one of my awesome UK fans, Claire, to take a first look at it and she loved it. (Thanks Claire.)
The next book that will be released is my first Dark Reflections full novel, which will be told primarily from the point of view of Alec. I'm hoping for this one to go live sometime in December, after which the second Dark Reflections book (featuring Adri) should be released in Feb 2014.
From a purely business perspective it could be argued that I'm being really stupid to write anything other than Alec and Adri books right now. Trapped, Intrusion, and the Greater Darkness haven't sold anywhere nearly as well as the Alec and Adri books.
All I can figure is that a lot of readers see names other than Alec and Adri's in the blurbs and choose to skip those particular stories, which is a shame because I've received really good feedback on some of those stories and ultimately they are a big part of what goes into making the Reflections universe—Alec and Adri's story—more full and complex.
I'm probably preaching to the choir as it's mostly my most hardcore fans that are going to end up reading this, but I do hope that you'll pick up the new releases even when they aren't directly Alec and Adri books.
On several levels I feel like I had to write these two Dark Reflections book before I could continue on with Alec and Adri, just like I have to flesh out Geoffrey's story a little more before I can continue on with Jasmin and Ben's story.
Dark Reflections gives me a chance to explore other sides to characters we already know and love as well as showing the humanity of some of our favorite villains. Dark Reflections is an alternate timeline, a parallel universe, but it's tightly intertwined with the core Reflections story and it's going to offer a level of depth that I simply couldn't pull off any other way.
Dark Reflections is a story of what could have happened. It's a grimmer place than the Reflections timeline, but not everything is terrible. Like anything else it's a balance of good and bad, but more than anything else, it shows just how much impact the actions, even just the existence, of one person can have.
I can't tell you for sure yet what chapter of the story I'll pick up next. August is an 'off month' meaning that instead of writing I'm desperately trying to get through editing passes of the next Eldon Murphy book, the first Dark Reflections novel, and tie up loose ends for the release of Shattered Ties. If I have a few extra minutes in there I've got a whole slew of print books that need finished up, and a few other assorted projects.
In some ways the sheer breadth of the options I have to choose from is intimidating, especially as the separate storylines start to interact more with each other, but it's also incredibly exciting. I really think that this story is going to be something special. I'm not a good enough writer to write it all yet, but I can see how to get there and I do get a little better with each book.
I don't know if my books will ever have a movie made about them, or if millions of people will read these stories. It's possible that they will never make the kind of splash that I'd love to see them make, but regardless of how well or poorly they ultimately end up doing from a sales perspective, I really am grateful to have you all along for the ride, I'll try my absolute hardest to deliver on the potential of these books, both the Reflections series and the places I'm hoping to be able to go with Jain and Va'del's world.
Thanks again,
--Dean
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
Cover and Blurb for Shattered Ties (Guadel #4)
It's getting very close to September, in fact time is flying by almost too fast. I'm going to have to really hustle to get the last few items wrapped up that need doing so that I can get Shattered Ties up for pre-order on iTunes and Kobo.
I wanted to stop for just a second though and let you all see the cover and the blurb.
The setup:
Brittle Bonds (The Guadel Chronicles Volume 3) saw Va'del and Jain driven from their mountain home by traitors among the People. The pair's time in the lowlands, surrounded by hostile priests of a foreign religion, tested them in ways they never anticipated, but they never forgot their friends and family who were fighting and possibly even dying on the frozen slopes of the White Spike Mountains.
Shattered Ties picks up the story of that fight and follows the desperate efforts of Javin, On'li, Va'ma and the rest as they try to survive against overwhelming odds. The Guadel who were so opposed to Va'del joining their ranks are about to find out that he's the only person with any chance of saving them from the enemy that they created.
I wanted to stop for just a second though and let you all see the cover and the blurb.
Brittle Bonds (The Guadel Chronicles Volume 3) saw Va'del and Jain driven from their mountain home by traitors among the People. The pair's time in the lowlands, surrounded by hostile priests of a foreign religion, tested them in ways they never anticipated, but they never forgot their friends and family who were fighting and possibly even dying on the frozen slopes of the White Spike Mountains.
Shattered Ties picks up the story of that fight and follows the desperate efforts of Javin, On'li, Va'ma and the rest as they try to survive against overwhelming odds. The Guadel who were so opposed to Va'del joining their ranks are about to find out that he's the only person with any chance of saving them from the enemy that they created.
I especially love the wraparound cover that Katie did for the print version. Here it is, stripped down to mostly just the art.
I hope that you're all as excited about this one as I am. Shattered Ties posed some new challenges for me, but it's got more action and magic in it than the first three books combined and I'm happy with the final product.
Monday, July 1, 2013
Riven is Live!
I'm happy to announce that Riven, the next Reflections (Alec and Adri) book, is now live at
all of the major retailers.
The Setup:
Adri is the
happiest she's ever been, but a noose is slowly tightening around the entire
pack. Alec's victory in Chicago put the shape shifter ruling body on notice
that he was going to do everything he could to bring them down, but she knows
that right now he needs time to secure allies, time that they are almost certainly
not going to have.
Alec's power
has grown to a level Adri never would have believed possible just a few months
ago, but the Coun'hij has the perfect tool for killing him and destroying every
structure in Sanctuary. All indications are that Puppeteer is stalking them
with an army of bestial creatures who are immune to Alec's special ability.
Alec has
taken his first step towards reestablishing the monarchy, with him as the king,
and now that Adri is back in his life he seems to know who he wants to be his
queen, if they manage to survive. Unfortunately Adri never realized becoming
royalty was part of the bargain when they got back together.
You can find Riven at the following locations, and
a print version is hopefully only a few weeks away:
Sony, Diesel and others will follow as Riven makes
it into the Smashwords premium catalogue.
As indicated previously, Riven will be on sale for
$2.99 until the end of the week as a thank you to all of you, after which it
will revert to its normal price of $3.99.
In other news, the fourth Guadel Chronicles book,
Shattered Ties, will be released on September 1st and it will be
followed by another Eldon Murphy Reflections book featuring Geoffrey towards
the end of this year.
As always, thank you for everything that you are
doing to help spread the word and for coming along to see what happens on Adri
and Alec's journey together.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
An Ending
My favorite part of writing is seeing a story come together. It's almost like building something with blocks. You start out with an idea, but it isn't until you actually start building your structure that you realize all of the details that you didn't have quite right, that you hadn't thought through yet.
There's something incredibly magical about taking facets of a particular story and putting them together in ways that you didn't expect to when you started out. I'm constantly amazed at the way that things will just click into place almost without any help from me. Things that I put in without really thinking about them at the time turn out to be pivotal later on it the series.
That means that my writing process is a little bit of an exercise of faith each time. I always know at least a little bit of what needs to happen in a given book, but so much of it just happens during the course of actually sitting down to write.
Usually there are two big milestones to any book. The first is when I know how I want the book to end and the second is when I know how I'm going to get from wherever I am to that ending. Once I know those two things then finishing the book is mostly just a matter of putting in the time to get all of the words down on paper.
Last night I figured out how I'm going to end Alec and Adri's story. I don't know exactly how I'm going to get there still, but I know how the series is going to end; and that's incredibly liberating.
I sat down for half an hour or so last night when the idea first came to me and sketched out the essentials; who would be involved, what new characters need to be introduced before it could happen and some key changes that will need to take place in a couple of existing characters.
It wasn't until I finished getting that all down that I realized something else.
For most of the last twenty years I've had another story rattling around in the back of my head. It's a Wheel of Time style epic fantasy set in the same world as the Guadel Chronicles, and there are some overarching themes that I always planned on working into the story there. Oddly enough, the ending of the Reflections series will have some of the very same themes, just done in a different way.
I really wish I could tell you all more, but I'd probably better just leave it right there for now. I don't think this was just coincidence though. It feels a bit like I've got a story that I'm supposed to tell, and that it's determined to make sure that it's told regardless of anything else.
There's something incredibly magical about taking facets of a particular story and putting them together in ways that you didn't expect to when you started out. I'm constantly amazed at the way that things will just click into place almost without any help from me. Things that I put in without really thinking about them at the time turn out to be pivotal later on it the series.
That means that my writing process is a little bit of an exercise of faith each time. I always know at least a little bit of what needs to happen in a given book, but so much of it just happens during the course of actually sitting down to write.
Usually there are two big milestones to any book. The first is when I know how I want the book to end and the second is when I know how I'm going to get from wherever I am to that ending. Once I know those two things then finishing the book is mostly just a matter of putting in the time to get all of the words down on paper.
Last night I figured out how I'm going to end Alec and Adri's story. I don't know exactly how I'm going to get there still, but I know how the series is going to end; and that's incredibly liberating.
I sat down for half an hour or so last night when the idea first came to me and sketched out the essentials; who would be involved, what new characters need to be introduced before it could happen and some key changes that will need to take place in a couple of existing characters.
It wasn't until I finished getting that all down that I realized something else.
For most of the last twenty years I've had another story rattling around in the back of my head. It's a Wheel of Time style epic fantasy set in the same world as the Guadel Chronicles, and there are some overarching themes that I always planned on working into the story there. Oddly enough, the ending of the Reflections series will have some of the very same themes, just done in a different way.
I really wish I could tell you all more, but I'd probably better just leave it right there for now. I don't think this was just coincidence though. It feels a bit like I've got a story that I'm supposed to tell, and that it's determined to make sure that it's told regardless of anything else.
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Riven Cover Reveal...sort of
Katie has finished the cover for Riven, but this time we've done things smart and we did the print cover from the start rather than starting with an e-book cover and then coming back later and redoing everything so that we could release a print version.
The trickiest part this time around has been trying to settle on an border that we felt like dealt with the transition between the left side of the girl's face and the spine of the book. I'm in the process of ordering print proofs for our final four versions, which will probably be what decides things for us, but I thought that all of you might want to see what we've got so far.
(Remember the printing process results in .125 inches being cut off from all four sides, so the border you see here will be half the size on the actual printed books.)
I think that Katie and I are leaning to #1 for the print version and the gold border from #3 for the e-book, but I'd love to hear what you think.
The blurb on this one may not be what I end up using when all is said and done, but it gives you a bit of a feel for what's in store :)
Dean
The trickiest part this time around has been trying to settle on an border that we felt like dealt with the transition between the left side of the girl's face and the spine of the book. I'm in the process of ordering print proofs for our final four versions, which will probably be what decides things for us, but I thought that all of you might want to see what we've got so far.
(Remember the printing process results in .125 inches being cut off from all four sides, so the border you see here will be half the size on the actual printed books.)
I think that Katie and I are leaning to #1 for the print version and the gold border from #3 for the e-book, but I'd love to hear what you think.
The blurb on this one may not be what I end up using when all is said and done, but it gives you a bit of a feel for what's in store :)
Dean
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