Skip to content

Tag: Novels

Posted
August 26, 2017
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
2 Responses

Wonder Woman sucks and so will Black Panther

I can’t understand the hype for WonderWoman. I simply can’t bring myself to understand how a movie, which shits the bed in the third act, can get so many glowing reviews.

I would give the movie a 6 out of 10 stars at best, and that was only because the first half was so strong. I keep scratching my head, wondering how a movie can be so completely different from the start to the end. It was like the movie was directed by two different directors.

Now I have a feeling I know why it got so many great reviews from critics, but I’ll come back to that later.

Now the first half was strong, it set up the origins of the protagonist beautifully, with the right amount of back story and open ended questions that needed to be asked later. It showcased all the characters and when the group formed, that would help our main character out, they all slotted together, with each character bouncing off the other.

So far so good right?

Yeah, I thought so.

I know a lot of people criticised the main character as annoying or stupid, and that the actress who played the role didn’t give a wide range of emotions, but you have to remember that the protagonist is sort of a child.

She was sheltered from the outside world her whole life, she hasn’t seen the horrors of the world fully, and doesn’t understand that some people can be evil because they are.

Its sort of the rich kid who has been in boarding school their whole life, now trying to make a living in the ghetto.

I thought the actress played it great, to the point of me being annoying at the character. I was annoyed at the character because I was invested, I wanted her to awake up and smell the roses.

No, none of that was a problem for me. What was, was the shit show, which was the ending of the movie.

What. The. Fuck.

The final battle was so cliche filled with terrible CGI, that I didn’t know what was going on half the time. It was just down right…. Bad. Added with 80’s style one liners that made me shake my head, I felt like I was cheated out of my cinema money.

OH, OH!

Also the big reveal that the protagonist was indeed a god was just tossed into conversation, like a jockstrap in a washing hamper.

The only thing that was good about the ending of the story, was that Chris Pine stole the show with his sacrifice.

Now if you look at rotten apples, which has rated this movie so high, you would be lead to believe that this movie is actually good. And it is at some parts, but the reason that this movie is so highly rated on there is that far left liberal film critics, are bending over backwards to praise this movie because it stars a female lead.

The first female lead in a superhero movie.

But they shouldn’t.

Regardless if this movie is starring a female lead, black lead, transgender lead or anything between, it shouldn’t be given special treatment because then you are making a mockery of your own grading system.

If you compare rotten apples reviews to IMDB, where regular movie goers post their comments you would see a night and day difference. IMDB’s rankings for the movie is two stars lower. With many people asking on that site, why hasn’t anyone given an honest review of the movie on rotten apples.

When we allow political opinions, to shade what is good or bad then we are on a downward spiral to mediocrity in our entertainment.

We should be pushing the boundaries. Not catering to any crap because it might align to our agendas.

This is the same reason that Black Panther with the first male black man as a superhero will be shit!

The movie will be a terrible mixture of hip hop video like material, with black people trying to act super fly. It will be cliche filled, and it won’t be real. For some reason, Hollywood can’t make a serious film with people in colour, without it being…. Type casted!

Just once, once in my lifetime, can I get a film where my black lead doesn’t talk with a heavy slang accent or come from the streets. Or is something between.

And I know everyone reading this will be saying, but Black Panther is an African king and blah, blah, blah.

It still will be missing something, something I wish I could describe in words but… I can’t.

It’s why Red Tails should have been a great movie and failed, and its why this one will be the same.

Sigh…

Look, my grandmother had a saying. If you want to do well in any industry and you’re a minority, then you have to surpass the competition till people can’t ignore you.

And I don’t see us getting there, by want Hollywood has been putting out lately.

I may be wrong, I hope I am, but Hollywood hasn’t proved me wrong so far.

Posted
May 15, 2017
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

Longevity over everything else

The time for my latest launch is nearly upon us. Well, when I say nearly, what I really mean is in a month and a bit. The closer I get to that deadline the more I want to see what happens, but its also the time where self doubt starts to creep in.

Doubt about how good the books in the new series really are.

Doubts about if it will make any money or will it just be a flop.

Doubts that I may get all one star reviews and people will hate it.

All authors have doubts. Some more than others. I place myself on the very start of the scale, as in I care a little bit, how people will take my books but not really. Once I like what I produce and I’m happy with it, I really don’t care what people think too much. Now don’t take that as I don’t take criticism well, because I do. If a reader highlights something that I can improve on, then I will look into it.

But if it’s just this book is shit! Then I really can’t work with that. Either give me a clear and precise point or fuck off!

But the reason I am writing this blog, is because in the mist of fear we tend to take the easy shortcuts. Be it a quick scheme to make money, or a choice that will give us quicker results.

But what we should always go for, is longevity.

Leaving a legacy is all we as artist should care about. It shouldn’t be what genre I can write in quickly, or how I can make a quick buck.

It should be the path that you can see yourself staying on for the next five to ten years.

The double L’s, is the name of the game.

Longevity + legacy= Success

This new series I am writing in, is a book that I saw missing in a genre that was all about the gadgets and not about the characters. In the sci-fi genre, I have only read a handful of series that made me happy. I love guardians of the galaxy and firefly, but there was nothing like that in book form, so instead of complaining I tackled the topic head on.

Now, the reason that these books don’t exist, is because the audience simply isn’t there for them. If that’s the case there is not much I can do. But till I try, I shall never know, and I shall always be wondering.

Better to do, then to wonder.

As Osho once said- Instead of stopping to think if you should jump off, jump off, and then you’ll have all the time you need to think on your way down.

Anyway

 

Until next time

Good Morning

Good Evening

Good Night

Posted
January 30, 2017
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

Speaker of the dead!

I finished speaker of the dead this week by Orson Scott Card, and while I think Enders game was a better book. This novel was simply brilliant. Nothing major happened in it. There was no planet defining battles. There were no explosions. There was no great war. There was no evil bad guy.

Thinking about it now, there really wasn’t a protagonist in the real sense that we know it to be. But I’ll get onto that later. For anyone new to the game of writing, and I mean you haven’t  got ten years under your belt, this book is a great read to see how to keep a reader engaged just by human emotions.

This book for me is the most literary book I have read in a while, I think the last one before that was the Kite Runner which was four years ago. Shit maybe more. But anyway this book to me was more literary than that.

I think people get caught up in the trap that literary books can only be about past or current events. There can’t be any aliens, there can’t be any spaceships, there can’t be any magic swords or rings.

But Orson for me anyway, has shown that you can have space and aliens and still make the book thought provoking.

It was masterful how each characters real enemy was themselves.

And that’s what as human beings we struggle most with right? Just getting out of our way. Just trying not to fuck up long enough so we actually get to our goal. And this book had that in spades.

Halfway through when I saw that there was no real war. No real actual violent conflict about to take place, I thought I would be bored. But nah, I kept on reading, because Orson had me invested in the characters simple life’s.

(By the way I have heard people call him by Scot. So I don’t know if that’s what he likes to be called.)

I think Orson, highlighted in such a beautiful way what it means to be human, by showing us our flaws when compared to the other alien race in the book.

The book was slow for me to read, because it didn’t flow as easily as I would like a book to. Some books are great wines, some are water, some are spirits.

I like my books to be a lot plainer to read. Less condense.

It’s the difference in reading a hard sci-fi book, to say something called Monster Hunter.

(I know that may not make sense. But writers and hardcore readers will understand where I’m coming from.)

All in all,

It was a cool book.

But I don’t think I would read it again.

Until next time

Good Morning

Good Evening

Good Night

Posted
October 11, 2016
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

SFF Mega Promo – October

 

instafreebie-sff4

 

The SFF Mega Promo, organised by Irish author Dean F. Wilson, is one of the biggest on the internet, with over 100 authors participating, giving you, the reader, the very best in speculative fiction — for free!

Click the link below to download as many as you want for free!

FREE BOOKS

Posted
July 13, 2016
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

What have I been up to!

What have I been up to?

Well that is an interesting discussion. You may not think so, but all authors are self righteous asshole’s who think everyone should read their work. While else would you want to become a writer, than have millions of strangers praise you for the finery of your written work.

None!

What.So.Ever.

But seeing as this is a blog and you have become used to my ramblings, I may as well tell you what I have been up to.

First and foremost, I have received my latest cover for my Fallen Angels series. I will post what it looks like sometime next week or the week after.

It looks amazing!!!!

The best one yet, and I can’t thank Glendon from Street Light Graphics enough. Something weird happened regarding that cover.

I didn’t tell him what happened in the story, I didn’t give him any clues about the book. Just told him to let his imagination run wild and what he came out with was as close to perfection as you can get.

It is almost like the cover was made for the story. I know some writers see their cover first and work the story around it. But this was just done by pure luck. Nothing else, nothing more.

So that is now done and finished.

Secondly, I am going through the editors copy of the latest book in the Fallen Angels series. This may be the final one. I really don’t know how well it will turn out. Because I have done zero marketing for it, I can’t really gauge it’s success.

When I market it later this year, I will be able to tell if it is something that I want to continue writing or not.

If the demand is high for it I may do.

If it dies a horrible death then at least I tried.

It was a fun first series to sink my teeth into, to learn the basics of my craft.

What more can I ask for.

The final and last thing that I am really proud of, is that I have finished my first ever sci-fi book. It was the quickest thing I have ever written and If I am honest, was the most fun. I tried to write to market and make it as fast pace as I could. But some of me got in the book which isn’t always a bad thing.

Now I have to go back and see what I should leave in and what I should take out.

It came out at 67K. That number may go up or down, we shall see.

67K is about right for the type of genre that it is in, but right now like I said it is just a mould of clay the real process begins now.

And…..that’s about it really.

I haven’t posted on here much as all my brain and willpower, are being used to pump out more and more fiction words. So now that am taking a little break, I can give this blog some love and attention.

I say that. But theres editing to be done. Marketing to be done. Dates to be scheduled.

Sigh.

Guess the break will have to wait.

Till next time.

Good Morning.

Good Evening.

Good Night.

 

Posted
May 16, 2016
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

Failures

Failure-Celebrated

I have failed a lot in my life.

Shit

Thinking about it now, my eyes grow moist at all the failures that I have gone through and not learnt from. I am a hard headed stubborn bastard, who sometimes needs to go through a experience more than once so it sinks into his head. And I know that is a major fault of mine.

I know it’s stupid. Its something that I am trying to change.

Learning from your mistakes is important, but not making any or seeing them ahead of you so you can sidestep them is even better.

This year I have tried my upmost to stop making mistakes.

And you know what.

I failed miserably..

We are only five months in this year and the growing list of mistakes I have made keeps on growing, and growing, and growing.

But last night, I battled with myself and stopped myself from making one.

I TOOK CONTROL AND STOPPED.

Now this isn’t going to be a speech about, motivation or achieving your goals or any of that bull. Its just one man’s thoughts on how we are all human. It’s just one man’s thoughts on the struggle it takes to change yourself.

This year my goal was and still is self-growth and change.

I accomplished a lot last year. But it was with 60% of my overall effort. Everyone else looking from the outside in, would have been amazed at what I had accomplished. But honestly. It was easy.

It was easy to write a book. It was easy to learn about this how self-publishing business. It was easy to get all my ducks in a row.

But what isn’t easy, is knowing within myself that I could have done better. I could have archived more. I could have grown more.

So as the new years starts proper, none of this January business. I have made a promise to myself that I will attack it like it owes me money.

An in a lot of ways it does.

Remember that what you do, is a lot more important than what you say.

I just have to remember that myself sometimes.

Until next time

Good Morning

Good Evening

Good Night16

Posted
May 9, 2016
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
2 Responses

What did I learn from completing a book series.

I treat this blog, the same way I would treat a dairy. So a lot of the words on this blog, website, page, are a lot closer to me than they should be. Half of the writing population will bare their soul out in their work. But even less than that, will bare their soul on outlets like this.

I understand why.

10Your time writing blogs, could be better spent writing novels.

And

Yes

That is true.

But like I said this blog for me, is more of a personal diary than anything else. So I write on here when I need to get things off my chest, thoughts down on paper, that sort of thing.

So today I am going to talk about what I learned from finishing my first series.

The Fallen Angels Series contains 2 novellas and 2 novels.

From the get go, I can say without a doubt that I should have just done a trilogy and been done with it.  I think doing that hurt sales and more importantly pissed off readers.

For that I am truly sorry. Lesson learnt.

The second thing that I should have done is learn about the craft of writing more. I am a doer. I jump into something with both feet and only learn how to swim, when am rapidly sinking to the bottom.

I should have taken a few months out just to read books on the wonderful world of craft.

But I didn’t.

Not much I can do about it now.

And last but not least I should have plotted out my story more. At least have some sort of idea, about what my story was about.

Instead I just said to myself, I want to write a story about Angels, and I just did it.

The characters, the plot, the story line, just came as I wrote.

It was  the most pantser’s, pantser’s book that has ever been written.

But a story did come out of it.

Apart from all the negatives above I did some things right.

I stuck to my guns and wrote Two hundred and Ten thousand words.

I found out that if I wrote everyday a book would come.

I didn’t do anything by half measures. I got the best of everything that concerning my books.

From the best editor that suited my style.

From the best cover designer, that bought my dreams alive.

To the best proofreaders, that caught stupid typo’s that I just plain couldn’t see.

I invested everything into those books and for that I can hold my head up high.

It still doesn’t feel real to call myself a author.

But people have officially paid me for my books. So I guess I can.

Do I wish that my first series sold better.

Yes.

Will that stop me from writing another.

No.

Till next time folks

Good Morning

Good Evening

Good Night

Posted
April 11, 2016
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

The highs and lows of writing

I am a very optimistic person, or I would like to think so. I always have a smile on my face and tend to see the sunny side of every situation that I am in. No matter what it is, I believe that you can always grow from the experience that has befallen you. When you can look back on your worst day and learn from it, then you can move on from that pain of the experience.

But writing, boy does it seems to kick you in the teeth. Unless you have skin like a rhino, then you will not last long in this game.  Some of the reviews that you receive can be pretty hurtful, if you let them get to you. Some authors I know don’t even read reviews anymore, they simply flat out refuse to.  But that in itself, I think can harm you a lot more.

When your first starting out, and you don’t have beta readers to highlight where the story lags and where it doesn’t work, reviews can do that for you. Not every review will be helpful, but the ones that tells you what didn’t work for them you can disgust that and use it in your later work.

Reviews like “Rubbish.” With nothing else written, just ignore. As well as any personal attacks, these do not help and can just be met with a shake of the head and move on.  But others that really break down your book, use it to your own advantage so your next book is tighter, stronger, better.

I will admit the above is not easy to do.

Trust me, I know.

It will have you doubting your work, hating everything that you write, and can sometimes led to writers block if you let it. But what I have learned and what works for me, is that once your book is out in the world for people to buy it, you can’t be that attached to it.

If you are a self published author, then you must treat your book like a publisher. If something doesn’t work change it. If a cover is wrong for the genre, that you write, change it. If the story sucks then it may be time to un-publish it and try again.

When you are creating your work of art, treat it like your best friend, lover, soul mate, to get the most out of that book. But once the work is done. It’s done.

Treat it like a brief love affair, then move on. Get what you can from it, experience, knowledge, what works and what didn’t, but once you hit publish.

Thats it!

It really doesn’t belong to you anymore.

I know we all get attached to our work, but getting better at anything is a painful process.
Posted
April 5, 2016
Category
Uncategorized
Tags
, , , , , , , , , , ,
Comments
0 Responses

My Ideas

I wanted to take a minute, and just tell readers how my first ever series Fallen Angels came to be. Really I honestly can’t quite tell you. Not for certain. I try and recall how it came about, but this idea has been knocking around in my head for so long, that it just seems to have always been there. From as far back as I can remember, I had this need to tell an Angel story. I knew how the first book would end, and how it would start. But apart from that, everything else was just one big blur.

It felt as if I was looking through a window smeared with grease, and didn’t know were it would led if I smashed through it.

Looking back at it now, with the series nearly finished, and taking a critical eye, over the whole thing. I can see where I went wrong with it.

I simply wrote for myself.

It was a story that I needed to tell, that has a lot of me in it. But apart from that, the story as a whole, doesn’t really fit in any genre. It doesn’t fit any category. It was just a story that I always had buried inside of me.

And I am happy that I told it. But judging from the sales of this series or should I say lack of it, it will always be a niche series written by me. But thats okay, because it has taught me so many valuable lessons. On story structure, story development, character development, the whole nine yards.

Now that I can take a step back, I can see the mistakes I made. Where I showed and not told. Where I added to much to the story instead of taking it away. Where the story was too lean, when it needed more meat on its bones.  I could go on and on, but after each book was finished, I leaned back in my chair and was happy that I couldn’t improve it any more.  I was happy with the finished product, and because of that, I can hold my head high.

Its only after some time has passed, when you grow in skill. Do you realise how lacking the book really is.

But I don’t think that will ever change, if you’re always looking to improve your story telling craft. That’s the only way you can really grow, by reading other peoples works, and reading books on craft. I am loving it, and having a blast at the moment reading everything I can get my hands on relating to the subject. I feel like a video game character, improving daily by the more info I dump into my brain.

I was never afraid of releasing my book. Well I may have been afraid a little bit. But I knew that no matter how much work I put into it, it would never be up to scratch in my eyes. When you have put that much work into something, it will never truly live up to your dreams. But like I said, thats okay.

I can only get better by writing more words. Day in, day out.

They say that you won’t learn the basics of story craft, unless you have a million words under your belt in fiction. Many writers believe also, thats where you truly start finding your voice.

I don’t know how true or false that may be.

But I have another Sixty-Five hundred thousand words to go, I can’t wait to tackle it one word at a time.

Until next time.

Love and Peace

Y’all

1 2