Storytellersunplugged

Stop me before I kill again. I’m going to do it, yes, I am, I’m really going to do it. Going to write about another obscure topic so ephemeral that I don’t know if I can pull it off. You may have noticed that I shy away from the easy stuff – practical stuff with practical answers. Not that those things aren’t invaluable – they are – but all the sane and successful writers in this blog do an admirable ... Read More

My first word was “Boo!” and I’ve loved surprises ever since.  I want to discover things.  Refine that, I want to discover hidden things, things that have meaning.  I want there to be more than five senses can take in.  Five senses are standard issue.  Most critters with fin, skin, fur or feathers have them, often with a superior specialty.  Jack rabbits out-hear me.  Eagles out-see me.  I’m tied with the koala bear.  But word has it that heart, mind and soul ... Read More

Have you ever noticed that the outcomes to life’s most successful quests can’t really be foreseen in detail?  If it’s an initiative that your heart is truly into, then whatever concept you have of success ahead of time, the outcome ends up exceeding it.  “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”  But starting out all you can see are the complexities and the problems up front.  The solutions build stroke by stroke like a painting taking on shape and color.  In the ... Read More

There are people who can’t help but be different, and people who choose to be different, and people who live in fear of being different. If you’re a writer, that third category is a killer. In fact, it’s a killer for just about anything that isn’t sedentary, unimaginative or uninspiring. I’m writing about ways of thinking, of course, and let me just call that fear category S3S for Stage 3 Suffocation. Excitement and discovery don’t happen much by ... Read More

Several years ago, when I first got into this business, someone told me that it is better to be published well than to simply be published. I thought I knew what that meant. But I’ve come to understand that sometimes, you think you are being published well, when in reality, you are not. Case in point. In 2005, Pocket Books published my second mass market novel, HERETIC. It was the first book in a series known as the Templar Chronicles, a ... Read More

We all know the drill. You bust your hump writing your latest novel. Your agent sells it to a major New York publisher. You wait another ten to eighteen months before your book sees print. You’re excited, enthused, ready to take on the world – this is the book that is going to be your breakout work. Big time here you come! Six weeks later your newest “masterpiece” is relegated to the returns bin in the back of ... Read More