Showing posts with label book. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book. Show all posts

Friday, January 5, 2024

I am alive! And I've returned with not only a new novel, but my first actual physical release, with both paperback and hardcover editions available. Getting both of those set up was a real pain in the ass, though, as the program I usually use for image editing (an ancient version of Paintshop Pro) simply couldn't process images big enough without slowing to a crawl. And even when I did seem to get the covers made properly, converting them into PDF documents didn't work as intended, as their resolution ended up being so huge that only a tiny portion of the image showed up on the cover. Apparently because I was supposed to crop the background even though the rest of it wasn't visible beyond the image borders anyway. But hey, I finally got it done and learned something for the future, so that's something, at least! And since I plan to buy a new PC sometime this year (after having used my current one for about eight years), I hopefully shouldn't have to struggle with as much performance issues in the future.
 
To make sure the actual interior of the book looks good, I also spent some money on Atticus, which makes it incredibly easy to format both physical books as well as e-books, though I still spent considerable time fine-tuning all the settings and trying out different dividers. Though I ended up going with none of them, as all of them take up too much space for my taste, especially if they show up near the beginning or end of a page. And even a two line break looks off to me, so I ended up going with a single line for every scene break instead.
 
Apart from that, my only real gripe with the program would be that it doesn't offer a fully functional offline version. Sure, you can work on your latest book while offline, but only if you signed into Atticus while you still had an internet connection. And the most important part, converting the book to pdf and epub, can only be done online. Which may not be too much of an issue in this day and age, but if the site ever went offline, it would also render Atticus useless.
 
Aside from that, I can wholeheartedly recommend it, especially since it requires only a one-time payment. Though anyone that owns a Mac might want to have a look at Vellum instead, which is also supposed to be really good and seems to work entirely offline. So it may have been a better option for me too ... if I actually owned a Mac, or ever planned to buy one. But I can't even justify buying a game console since they always end up gathering dust, so a Mac would be even worse off.
 
Anyway, as for the book itself: here's the cover, whose blurb should hopefully be all I need to say about it! The only thing it doesn't mention is that it also takes place in my Mortaevum universe. Haven't gotten any of the physical copies myself yet, since I tinkered with the cover until the very last moment, and author copies would take a while to arrive, which could be a problem since I'm supposed to move sometime in the near future. Might have to get some retail copies instead to make use of my free Prime membership before it expires.

Mortaevum Fantasy Horror Novel



I've done more than just finish a single book, however. I actually decided to participate in NaNoWriMo last November for the very first time. And I hit the 50k goal with time to spare! Though I didn't manage to actually finish the book, which will most likely end up twice as long, at the very least. As to what it is: an indirect sequel to Lifelines, part murder mystery, part killing game, and somewhat inspired by the visual novels Zero Escape, Ever17 and Dei Gratia in the fifth day. The last two especially, since the story also takes place in the deep sea, but is supposed to offer a bit more tension than either of these visual novels, which have way too many slice of life moments. No idea when I'll manage to get the book done, however.

And since I finally released a physical book (because someone urged me to), I want to do the same for Grim Memoria and Lifelines, but that will also take some time. Partially because I might want to create new covers, but also because I want to look through them again. And also write a whole new ending for Grim Memoria, as I no longer like how vague I left it in the original release.

And that's about everything of note. So let's see if I'll manage to re-release these books and also finish that Lifelines sequel. Getting at least one of my full length Mortaevum novels out there also couldn't hurt, but will most likely require more revisions, as I plan to rewrite an entire chapter, and also make some changes to the one directly afterwards, so that something that happened early on in the book actually has a proper payoff (instead of none at all).

Thursday, December 1, 2016

After going through Grim Memoria multiple times, I've finally decided on a release date! While I could upload the book right now, I want to make sure that I haven't overlooked any errors, especially where missing letters are concerned. And I want to see if anyone else is interested in getting a review copy, as I've only received one reply so far. So I'll give it ten more days and will release the book around the 10th of December!

I also thought of including two short stories that are somewhat connected to the events of Grim Memoria. Then I realized I couldn't do that as both of them have already been published on other sites. And I'd really like to make use of KU for the time being. That's why everyone who signs up for my newsletter (or has already signed up) will get a free story when Grim Memoria comes out. It's nothing huge and also nothing new, but it seems to help other people getting newsletter subscribers, so I might as well give it a try.

Until then, don't forget the $20 Paypal Giveaway! You can earn additional points every day. And the more you get, the better your chances.

Fantas novel

Sunday, November 24, 2013

I was a bit busy in the last few days and today I've been watching the Doctor Who anniversary and will rewatch it later on so I didn't manage to write that much new content. But here's the second chapter and I'll have to see how much more of the short story I'actually post as it's much more than a first draft already.
Maybe it'll change a bit more when I'm actually done.

Chapter 2: Nowhere


I don't know how much time had passed but eventually my consciousness returned once more. Contrary to last time I couldn't hear anything at all and it looked like I was surrounded by total darkness.
Since my flashlight seemed to be missing I pulled out my smartphone to use it as a light source. As soon as I turned it on my eyes were glued to the screen.

October 32st, 25:83h

“What the...? Is it broken?”
Under normal circumstanced it should have been...but how could I call it normal when people had been spirited away right in front of my eyes...well, close to me at least. Trying to ignore the impossible date I turned the phone away from me and looked at my surroundings. I was sitting in a small room made of stone...although it didn't actually feel like stone...more like...flesh? I quickly withdrew my hand.
My flashlight was lying just out of arms reach but apart from that the room seemed to be completely empty while the doorway was blocked by something I couldn't really make out in the dim light my phone provided, so I picked up my flashlight and stood up.
Strangely enough my body had completely recovered but as I felt neither hungry nor thirsty it couldn't have been that long since I crashed into the tree.
Now how do I get out of here?
I shone my flashlight at the exit but all I could see was an impenetrable wall of darkness. Kinda like fog, just much thicker. There didn't seem to be any other way out so I took a few steps forward. My heart began to race as I reached out tentatively, imagining every possible horror scenario I could think of. It might have engulfed my whole body, devouring me very slowly while keeping me alive throughout the whole process.
But nothing of the sort happened. It simply turned to dust and disappeared.
Huh...that was way too easy...
I stepped outside and found myself standing inside a corridor that seemed to stretch endlessly in two directions. Opposite to my room was another wall of darkness and although it might have been stupid I also touched it to see what lay behind it but this one didn't even budge.
Hm...now which way do I go?
I checked out both directions but they didn't seem to have any distinguishing features. Just endless hallways lined by even more rooms. I tried to open another one but apparently only the occupant could actually open it. Why would anyone build cells that can only be opened from inside? Maybe to lull the prisoners into a false sense of security before the real horror starts...who knows?
“Hello, is anybody in there?” I pressed my ear to the wall so I didn't miss anything but nobody answered. That's when I noticed a strange sensation, as if the walls were shaking. It reminded me of a movie I'd seen once.
I kneeled down and looked at the ground. It was barely visible but it seemed to be shaking. I closed my eyes and listened very intently....bam bam...bam bam...it sounded like...footsteps. Opening my eyes I panicked and spun around in a circle, trying to make out where this creature was coming from. But this isn't what I was made for so ultimately I had to decide on a whim and ran like hell.

The corridor went on and on and on and the further I went the more unstable it seemed to become. The walls shimmered in and out of existence as if something was trying to replace them and once in a while parts of the floor simply turned into sand, only to harden seconds later, nearly severing my foot a couple of times. My flashlight wouldn't stop flickering but I still noticed that it's light disappeared in the distance as if it was hitting another wall of darkness. I couldn't see any obstacles though.
Maybe I should have stopped but out of the corner of my eyes I could see something looking at me, as if the walls themselves were alive. I certainly had no interest in finding out if they actually were. Only a few more steps and...
It felt like someone had rammed his fist into my stomach. The air was forced out of my lungs while something slid down my throat even though there didn't seem to be anything in front of me. I chocked, unable to breath and dropped my flashlight to reach for whatever was trying to enter my body. My hands touched something slimy but were unable to get a grip on it, especially because it just got bigger and bigger. My body felt like it was going to explode any minute now as more and more of this thing forced itself into my body with no end in sight. I fell to my knees and was about to faint when it simply ended. 

Thursday, November 21, 2013

Hello and welcome to my new blog!


Here I'll post drafts of my short stories and novels to get feedback while working on them.

I haven't really written that much as I spend most of my time developing games where I didn't have to care about things like narration or descriptions. Most of the games I created were part of the same universe which grew bigger and bigger and would have led to a final showdown in the third game of my main series but it ultimately grew too big for me alone.
Maybe I could have found someone to help me but the third demo took more then 6 years to make and I really didn't like the beginning after having learned so much. So I needed to redo a whole chapter while still missing more then half of the game...which led to my decision to turn it into a book as this would enable me to create a good story from start to finish as no one wants to read a book with a mediocre beginning.

I don't know if I'll suceed as I can't just copy the game and add a bit of narration but it's worth a try, right? So I'll publish my first drafts on this blog to hopefully create something worth reading.

The first one won't have anything to do with my universe as I wanted to see if I'd be able to sell a short story before I work on a full-fledged novel. The story is nearly finished so I might not publish everything.

As soon as I'm done setting everything up I'll post the first part of the story. In the meantime you can have a look at one of the trailers I made for my game back in the day.