Wednesday, December 24, 2014

Merry Christmas, motherfuckers! ... And a Happy New Year!

I can't say it's been the greatest year of my life by far given the loss of a truly incredible human being that I can never get back, but the year definitely ended up with some good things to look back on too. That said, I'm not going to drag everyone through a long ass boring play by play of everything that happened. But I think I will mention a few things I didn't get around to before and some big things to come...

If you haven't already heard, Fantasy For Good: A Charitable Anthology edited by Richard Salter and Jordan Ellinger, including stories by pretty much most of the best names in fantasy (George R.R. Martin, Neil Gaiman, Piers Anthony, Carrie Vaughn, Katharine Kerr, Roger Zelazny, and a ton more), the sequel of sorts to Horror For Good: A Charitable Anthology (co-edited by yours truly), is now available in both trade paperback and Kindle from Amazon or at a discounted price directly from Nightscape Press. Other ebook formats are also available on our website and will soon be available through ebook stores everywhere. While HFG continues to raise funds by giving all net proceeds to amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research, Fantasy For Good has already raised a nice chunk for The Colon Cancer Alliance. So, if you haven't picked up your copy yet, you should probably get on that. Not trying to pressure you or anything but it is for a great cause! :-)

In other news SHINING IN CRIMSON is now gaining on 150,000 reads on Wattpad.com and I recently started serializing FADING IN DARKNESS there as well with occasional interruptions and advertisements from me here and there. Meanwhile, RISING FROM ASHES is coming along well now after a short period of bleak despair and near self destruction (aka whiny writer syndrome). Along with working on finishing RFA, I've also been working on several other novels and novellas and a nonfiction book in various stages of development and have apparently learned nothing at all about prioritizing over the
past thirty years or so... Go figure.

But at the same time, I've been putting together something I think will be truly special over the past few months. Very soon... like, any day now, I'll be launching my own Patreon account and with it, I'll be giving readers the option to join a sort of RSW book club, check out unreleased stories, get sneak peeks and samples of future works, watch videos and live streaming video of me reading, ask me questions about my work, my character, writing, editing, and publishing, and all sorts of stuff. (If you have no idea what Patreon is, here's a helpful link to get you up to speed.) In fact, as soon as that's ready, I'll come back and edit this blog post to have all the details and links. For now though, have a Merry Christmas, a Happy Hanukkah, a Happy Kwanzaa, a delightful Winter Solstice, and a fantastic New Year! Take it easy and all that jazz and maybe one of these days I'll actually start posting on this thing more regularly.


...Yeah... not fucking likely...

Wednesday, October 8, 2014

THE EVENT so far...


For those of you who might have missed some of the tour posts on Facebook given Facebook's new "Give us all your money if you want us to show people your posts" business practices, I thought I would do a recap of the Robert S. Wilson Thrown-Together-at-the-Last-Minute-Due-to-An-Overwhelming-Amount-of-Procrastination-and-Indecision Blog Tour and Book Giveaway Contest! So far there have been several blog posts and things:


And of course, this whole thing wouldn't be happening if it weren't for the releases. WHERE ALL LIGHT IS LEFT TO DIE, SOULSERVE: A Ray Garret/Lifeline Techno Thriller, THE NESTING PLACE, THE QUIET (Newly Revised and Extended), and my short story THE OTHERS (a PMMP One-Night Stands story) are now available. In order to make things easier, you can find them by clicking on the eBook retailer icons below. (Kobo is slow to add titles but WHERE ALL LIGHT IS LEFT TO DIE is currently available, the rest are on the way.)




I was hoping to have the final cover for Rising from Ashes ready to show off, but the cards did not play out the way I had hoped. But very soon there will be a great unveiling, so stay tuned. Take it easy and thanks again all of you who have taken the time to give my work, my blog, and/or my ramblings a chance. 

Monday, September 8, 2014

The Robert S. Wilson Thrown-Together-at-the-Last-Minute-Due-to-An-Overwhelming-Amount-of-Procrastination-and-Indecision Blog Tour and Book Giveaway Contest!

I'll be releasing four new titles this month as well as a revised and extended edition of my first published novella, THE QUIET. In order to celebrate these releases, I'm doing contests, giveaways, and a blog tour all month long and even pushing a little bit into October!

First of all, I'm proud to reveal the release date and cover for my upcoming short story THE OTHERS which will be out for Kindle on September 19th from Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing as part of their uber awesome One-Night Stands series! THE OTHERS is a dark science fiction tale (big surprise there, right?) written in a very experimental (for me at least) omniscient present tense format. (For those who don't understand writer viewpoint/tense speak that means it's written from an outside all-knowing point of view as if its happening as you read it.)



Next up, I already posted about my upcoming fiction collection WHERE ALL LIGHT IS LEFT TO DIE
due out on September 23rd (which the voices in my head won't let me get away without mentioning is also currently available for pre-order for Kindle on Amazon!). Thirteen tales in all. Awakened from the mind of Robert S. Wilson. Ripped from their slumber and stretched across the fabric of space and time, silently screaming into the farthest reaches of the cold dead void... where all light is left to die.



But there's obviously more in store this month.

My 2013 novella EXIT REALITY introduced folks to another side of my writing. One in which the very likely near future plugs our brains directly into the internet. A vast network of connected minds sharing experiences and memories both real and completely fabricated through a service known as the Lifeline. And it also introduced my character Ray Garret, an Antivii agent in charge of investigating murders in the dark shadowy tunnels of the Lifeline. Because when you connect yourself into the Lifeline, you don't just risk revealing personal information... you risk your very life and mind.

Seven days after the release of WHERE ALL LIGHT IS LEFT TO DIE, September 30th marks the coming of a new stand alone novella in the Ray Garret/Lifeline series. One I've been working on since I was still in the writing stages of EXIT REALITY, over two years ago: SOULSERVE: A RAY GARRET/LIFELINE TECHNO THRILLER! SOULSERVE is set chronologically before EXIT REALITY and it's not at all necessary to have read EXIT REALITY first, but you could possibly get more out of it if you have. At the same time you might enjoy reading the two stories in chronological order. I certainly welcome you to read them both in some order if you haven't already read EXIT REALITY yet. SOULSERVE is also available via Kindle pre-order RIGHT NOW!

Death is but a doorway... when SoulServe holds the key. 

One by one, a group of scientists at Brizen Health are being murdered by... something. Doctors, subjects, and even janitors are reporting disturbances in Section 671, the Neuro-Technical Division. Ever since the death of Dr. Carl Broxson, the server room in Section 671 has maintained a negative 65 degrees Fahrenheit. Printers turn themselves on and print out terrifying cryptic messages. People have been seeing things in and out of the virtual world of the Lifeline. Including the apparition of their beloved colleague Dr. Broxson himself. 

When local police realize the case leads directly into the deep digital canyon of the Lifeline, Antivii agent Ray Garret is called to the scene to get to the bottom of things before another brilliant mind can be taken. But when his wife, Rhonda, starts falling at random and begins to have seizures, the ghost in Brizen Health could be Ray's only hope to save the love of his life.

Lastly and a bit out of order, on September 23rd, I'll be releasing two stand alone novellas which will also be available in WHERE ALL LIGHT IS LEFT TO DIE for those who would rather read a single piece and don't enjoy collections (there are some out there...). THE NESTING PLACE (also currently available for Kindle pre-order) is a brand new science fiction novella from me that, while it does take a few steps on the dark side as most of my work usually does, it deviates from my norm in a more focused way. It tows the line between general science fiction and hard science fiction, and with mixing scientific ideas like m-theory, zero point energy, and supervoids, it is probably one of the most ambitious SF pieces I've written to date. I'll let my readers decide if the final story holds true to that ambition.

When Art Gibson's collie, Ginger, goes out of control, barking and digging at Dead Man's Hill, Art makes a chilling discovery: someone is trapped inside. Alive. Once rescued, the man himself is even stranger. Naked and unable to speak, he is taken to the hospital. As he recovers from an unknown shock, the fate of an entire universe is at stake. 

And finally, I'll be re-releasing my novella THE QUIET in Kindle format in a newly revised and extended edition that will replace the original version. For those of you who purchased THE QUIET for Kindle before, I believe it should update for you. If for some reason it doesn't come September 24th, email me at shiningincrimson@gmail.com and I'll make sure you get a copy of the newly updated novella.

James Benton might be the last man on earth. Racing to get to work, he finds random abandoned cars, smoldering pile-ups, and something even stranger. Everywhere he goes there's no grass, no people, not even a bird in the sky. Alone in a barren world, James travels west in search of someone, anyone who might have survived The Quiet.

With all that said, you can celebrate these releases with me here on my blog but even more so on THE EVENT's FACEBOOK PAGE! I'll be giving away books, I'll be doing contests to win more books... and there'll be plenty of other fun stuff going on along the way. So come join the party over there for the most up to date posts and interact with myself and others who I've managed to sucker into coming along for the ride!

And for those disappointed that RISING FROM ASHES: EMPIRE OF BLOOD BOOK THREE isn't among these new releases... you just might be pleasantly surprised with a huge announcement toward the end of the party...

Tuesday, August 19, 2014

Where All Light is Left to Die: A Collection of Darkness by Robert S. Wilson

Some of you might have noticed that I dabble in the written word from time to time... Over the past few years I've published a few stories here and there in anthologies, on Amazon, on webzines, and even a couple here on this blog. In the past few months I've been working on revising my very first published story which is also one of my most popular and yet most polarizing stories: The Quiet. I've also been working on further edits of a revised version of a little known tale I wrote several years ago and hid away deep in the 1s and 0s of my harddrive called The Nesting Place.

While I plan on publishing (republishing as far as The Quiet goes) these two novellas as stand alone eBooks, I also realized that I had a number of stories I felt would work well collected together including these two. So, lo and behold...



Available to pre-order now for Kindle (will be sent to your Kindle September 23rd, 2014.)!

With six short stories, four flash tales, two novellas, and one novelette, it will clock clocks in right around 80k at approximately 74,000 words. The current final TOC (which could very well change between now and release) is as follows:
  • The Death Catcher (originally published in Fear the Reaper from Crystal Lake Publishing)
  • Playing with Fire (exclusive to this collection)
  • The Singularity (exclusive to this collection)
  • The Last Time I Saw my Brother Nathan (originally published in A Quick Bite of Flesh from Hazardous Press)
  • Self-Aware (originally self-published as a stand alone short story)
  • The Boy in the Elevator (originally published in The Best of The Horror Society 2013)
  • Forcipules (originally self-published as a stand alone short story)
  • Calling Me Home (originally published here on my blog)
  • The Northern Continent The Resurrection of Tommy Derringer: An Empire of Blood Short Story (exclusive to this collection)
  • Reduction The Suits (exclusive to this collection)
  • The Quiet (revised and expanded version, will also be re-released soon as a stand-alone novella)
  • Through the Mindhole (originally self-published as a stand alone novelette)
  • The Nesting Place (new, but will also be released as a stand-alone novella)

When those with a special gift can catch your soul in that dark realm between here and hereafter and bring you back to life, who will save us all from the jealous void? 

Lurking between the crowds of men and women, there are those among us who feed on something other than plants and animals. Predators with a unique kind of prey. Predators of those who prey on women and children... Predators with a taste for justice. 

James Benton might be the last man on earth. Racing to get to work, he finds random abandoned cars, smoldering pile-ups, and something even stranger. Everywhere he goes there's no grass, no people, not even a bird in the sky. Alone in a barren world, James travels west in search of someone, anyone who might have survived The Quiet. 

When Art Gibson's collie, Ginger, goes out of control, barking and digging at Dead Man's Hill, Art makes a chilling discovery: someone is trapped inside. Alive. Once rescued, the man himself is even stranger. Naked and unable to speak, he is taken to the hospital. As he recovers from an unknown shock, the fate of an entire universe is at stake. 

Thirteen tales in all. Awakened from the mind of Robert S. Wilson. Ripped from their slumber and stretched across the fabric of space and time, silently screaming into the farthest reaches of the cold dead void... where all light is left to die.

Wednesday, August 6, 2014

RISING FROM ASHES: EMPIRE OF BLOOD BOOK THREE (unedited teaser)

Chapter 2

Jonny Cross



Light streamed past both sides of Jonny in a fluorescent blur of colors as he made his way through downtown New York. The vampires had been on his trail for weeks now and tonight they were close enough he could see them catching up with him, could hear their rushing footsteps. He knew they were fast enough to catch him and he couldn't understand why they didn't just snatch him out of reality with a flash of pale skin and dark clothes. It wasn't like anyone in the city would give a second look. It was New York City for Christ sakes. Even before the Empire took over it hadn't exactly been known as a city of compassion.
So they were keeping their distance from him, that much was obvious. But why? Jonny skidded  rubber at the bottom of his shoes against the sidewalk as he turned a corner, barely missing the street and a few pedestrians. Just before he passed the hard cinder-brick wall of the building next to him, he caught a glimpse of one of them. The vampire smirked in his direction, his face about eight feet off the ground with long yellow messy hair tangling down from his scalp and a big thick matted beard that masked a heavy jaw attached to an even heavier head. Strong heavy. Big heavy, like a man who'd spent all his living years hitting the gym day in and day out and then died and reawakened a massive chiseled sculpture of brute.
Jonny felt like an awful tiny mouse being chased by one hell of a nasty tom cat. He let his feet fall faster, having paced himself more evenly prior to actually being within visual distance of his pursuer. As he neared the end of the long cinder building, he looked back to the corner he'd just turned at and saw nothing and was just about to turn back and stop for a breather when he crashed into something painfully solid. Almost too solid. He bounced back and crumpled onto the sidewalk before he could get his head around to look at what he'd just run into. Blood was running down his scalp from where it had hit the crack in the concrete sidewalk and his vision was blurry, but he could see straight enough to make out the mammoth monster in front of him staring down and grinning at him.
"Jonny Cross," the vampire said like some neanderthal reading its first word from a cue card.
"Uh, huh, that's me, buddy." Jonny brushed off the thin sparkly dust of glass and dirt that now covered his pants courtesy of the lovely sidewalk and rose to his feet. He stared right into the vampire's eyes. "You found me. Now what the fuck do you want?"
The vampire's grin grew and he laughed heartily. Jonny couldn't help imagining a giant viking helmet on the guy's head as his muscles jiggled while he guffawed in that deep jughead voice.
"What's the matter? You some kind of monosyllabic motherfucker or sumthin'?"
The vampire's laughter ended abruptly and he looked at Jonny with glistening eyes of confusion.
Now it was Jonny's turn to laugh. "You have no idea what I just said, do you?" His laughter grew to an echo slapping back from the building across the street and Jonny went to turn and run but before he could even move his head twenty degrees, the bulky vampire's hand clamped onto his neck and picked him up off the ground, his feet dangling in mid air. The pressure of the creature's hand was burning against his skin and he knew that it was only a matter of seconds before his neck snapped if he didn't get away.
The vampire smiled up at him again. "You funny, eh?"
Jonny squeaked out an unintelligible response and the vampire's head tossed back with another uproar of laughter.
"You funny now."
Jonny managed to swing his foot hard enough that it nicked the vampire in the chin and again the laughter ceased and the vampire's face stewed with rage as the pressure around Jonny's neck grew. Jonny screamed as his whole body went into a cold sweat. He was just about to pass out when a familiar scratchy voice came from far off behind the vampire.
"Harek," the voice yelled. And before it could even echo back to its source, the enormous hand around Jonny's neck loosened and he felt himself gently lowering to the ground. In more display than need, he coughed and grabbed at his throat as he leaned over in front of the creature he now assumed was named Harek.
Slow casual steps echoed from the end of the street behind Harek making their way nearer to Jonny and his new companion. A figure in a long black trench coat came into view just beyond the vampire's thick girth and when the dim glow of the street light touched its face, Jonny's eyes widened with angry recognition. The Emperor smiled in response and stepped uncomfortably close.
"Please forgive Harek, his temper is as vast as it is ancient." And with that Harek stepped back and turned away as if to look out for any surprise guests that might happen along this small frightening gathering.
If Jonny had been afraid, he was certainly nearly terrified now. The fact that the Emperor had sought him out personally had landed on Jonny like a ton of bricks and he was sure there were some stray blocks about to fall as an aftershock. "Wh-what do you want?" Jonny was doing his best to keep his shaking hands in his pockets and not try and turn and run for it again. Besides, there was no way he could get away now.
The Emperor grabbed Jonny's chin and turned it sideways looking over the long scar along his cheek and running his fingers along the far side of his face and then locking them behind Jonny's head. A grip tighter than Harek's pulled his face up close to the Emperor's and he glared into Jonny's eyes. "You've been running a long time, Mr. Cross. A long long time indeed. I could barely even begin to count the number of times your name has ended up on the Penitent list and yet you always seem to slip through imperial fingers."
Jonny swallowed hard, his neck feeling like a rabbit's foot in a vice.
"I won't pretend not to revere the number of my followers you have led astray with your petty Catholic blasphemy. How many underground churches have managed to spring up wherever you happen to roam, Jonny? Twenty? Thirty, perhaps?"
Jonny stared into those fierce blue eyes less than an inch from his own and said nothing.
The Emperor smiled again. "Oh come on, son. Surely a man who has amassed such a movement must feel some ounce of pride at what he's accomplished? No?
"Well then, perhaps you're not as faithful to your holy trinity and its people as I thought you were. I suppose you'll feel no ill will if I send my legions of vampires into those filthy tunnels for a real communion--a truly worthy sacrifice of blood far more gruesome than the solitary crucifixion of your precious Christ!"
Jonny's face constricted with panic and a yelp of horror fell from his mouth.
"Oh, perhaps you are the man I was looking for, yes? The faithful servant who would die for the sins of the world." The Emperor laughed. "I'll tell you what. Let me offer you something your Christ could never give you. You do something for me--without question and without failure--and I'll turn a blind eye to the congregations of rats you have living down in my sewers and see to it that no harm comes to them." His hand relaxed behind Jonny's head and a deep terrible throbbing replaced the pressure of those unnaturally strong hands. Jonny tried rubbing his neck but it did him no good.
"And just what do you need me to do that you can't get done some other way?"
"Jonny boy, the time for you to know has not yet arrived. The third cock has yet to crow if you get my drift and I have something much more important--to you at least--to show you now. You see, Jonny, there's just one more piece of... insurance... I have taken in case your resolve starts to waver in the tasks I am yet to assign you."
Jonny's body temperature dropped to near zero and he was shaking uncontrollably now. "Wh-wh-what the hell are you talking about? What do--"
The Emperor's hand grabbed the back of Jonny's neck again as he turned to walk back the way he came from pulling Jonny along with him. Jonny stumbled to keep in step with the man.
"It'll be much more effective if you see what's at stake than if I tell you myself, Mr. Cross. I'm counting on your cooperation in this matter and if I'm to feel confident I've got your full attention, I'll need to see your face when you fully realize how imperative your situation truly is."
A black car waited at the end of the street. Harek opened the back passenger side door and the Emperor slid inside dragging Jonny along behind him. Inside it smelled of new car and lemon-scented car freshener. Jonny made eye contact with the driver through the rear-view mirror for a split second before a thick black pane of glass separated the back seat from the rest of the world. "Relax, Mr. Cross. In due time, you'll be back in your sewer scurrying about again." Jonny stared out the cloudy dark glass of the tinted passenger window seeing more of his reflection than the city outside. He'd never seen his face so visibly terrified before. He was sure he already knew what it was the Emperor was going to show him. He saw the Emperor behind him reflected in the glass, closed his eyes and prayed to Mother Mary that he was wrong. Then he prayed again for guidance.
And for protection from the devil sitting only inches to his left wearing a wicked grin and staring ahead at nothing.

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Hey Fuckers, Remember Me?

I'm still here... and today I have two really great pieces of news to throw out into the world. First of all...

SHINING IN CRIMSON: EMPIRE OF BLOOD BOOK ONE is now a Featured Story on Wattpad.com!!! 

I've been following Wattpad for a long time now and am extremely proud of how huge the site and its community have grown. And I'm honored and excited that they chose my debut novel to be among their list of Featured Stories! For those who don't know, Wattpad is a website and community with a free app available for just about any mobile device these days where you can read and share original fiction.





And for those who like to read shorter tales, my newest short short story THE KNOWING INSIDE JOHN will go online over at Darkfuse's Horror d'Oeuvres website on Friday, May 30th! The site is for subscribers only (free for Darkfuse book club members) and has a lot of great fiction from authors like Tim Waggoner, William Meikle, Brad C. Hodson, Nicole Cushing, Ray Wallace, and many more. This is my second story to be published by Horror d'Oeuvres and my third pro fiction sale.


That said, I have dozens of pots on the fire right now and several of them are beginning to burn, so until next time, kids, good day and goodbye!

Saturday, March 8, 2014

Standing and Breathing... On my Own, Above the Ashes

Be prepared... this is going to be a LONG one...

So, at this point, I'm not really sure where to begin, so this might end up just a bit chaotic. I know every time
I write one of these things, a LOT has transpired since I last posted. And this time is certainly no exception to that. If anything it's an exception on the opposite end of the spectrum. Late last year, Nightscape Press hit a pretty big bump in the road and that put a lot of my life in flux for lack of a better way to put it. For those of you who keep up with me on Facebook, you know that we moved to a place out in the country rather suddenly. This was a blessing quite much in surprise. But that's not all that important, really. Suffice it to say life is a little less hectic out here and we have a lot more room to breathe and the cost of living is roughly about the same, sometimes cheaper.

And I'm happy to say I've only ever seen so many stars in the night sky in Owen County, Indiana...

Moving on... Early in January, for those of you who are fans of my cyberpunk novella Exit Reality, I released a brand new Ray Garret/Lifeline story titled Self-Aware which may very well end up also being the first chapter to an upcoming Lifeline novel. If you are curious to check it out you can find it on Amazon, on Smashwords, iBooks for the iPad, and it should eventually be available at BN, Kobo, Sony, and all that before too long. So far it's not exactly flown off the shelves, but 99 cent short stories rarely do...

Anyway...

R.I.P. Michele, you will be missed.
We had fully moved in and spent our first night here as a family on New Year's Eve. Some things have taken some adjustment while others have been a huge relief. Balance and all that I suppose. However, late in January we lost two very dear friends.

First, about a week before the end of the month a sweet soul Jen and I only had the pleasure of knowing online who had been a huge supporter of my fiction and Nightscape Press and just generally a wonderful friend, Michele Dotson, went into a coma and passed away. Her efforts to spread the word of my work and her lively moderation of the Kindle Horror Books Facebook group will be sorely missed.

A beautiful voice... silenced forever. R.I.P brother.
Then... on the very last day of January just a month after we moved in to the new place, while still in the process of getting acclimated and settling in, we learned that a very good friend from Indiana, Daniel Jaffke, was murdered. Daniel was a singer/songwriter who I had been friends with for around fifteen years. Way back when I was actively playing in bands, we wrote and sang a song together for one of his old bands. Several years after that we started a small recording project that didn't quite take off. And for years after that we often talked about wanting to make time to work together again. That never happened and now he's gone. I was however lucky enough, the last time I saw him, we stayed up all night talking. I'll be forever grateful for that time. We did a lot of much needed catching up that night. That was back in June or July... Life has a way of really slapping you in the face sometimes.

Daniel and I singing the song we wrote together on stage with his band Steel Trap.

Daniel was the singer for several Indianapolis bands over the years including his most recent band linked from his pic above, Two O'clock Twilight. He was an amazing singer and songwriter and thanks to some lowlife piece of shit, his voice has been forever silenced and that's more of a tragedy than I can truly express. Though I did try, but I'll get to that later in this post.

(Here is a beautiful example of just how amazing a singer Daniel was.)

So, we traveled up to Indiana even though we really couldn't afford to because there was no way I was going to miss his funeral. The trip was hard, the funeral even harder, but a lot of great things happened too. For one, many of Daniel and my mutual friends worked hard before and right up to the funeral putting the word out about what happened to him and that his family was in financial need for the funeral. Via GoFundMe we raised more than enough to pay for the funeral. The amount of support and truly loyal friendship that came out of that was emotionally and mentally overwhelming (in a very bittersweet kind of way). The heartfelt thanks that Daniel's father gave to all of us at the funeral after everyone paid their respects nearly brought me to my knees. It was definitely a tribute to just how loved Daniel was.

But... as they say, and it stings so hard for me to repeat... "life goes on..." So, of course when we returned from the funeral in nearly mid February, a lot of things had piled up. Nightscape Press is in the process of recovering from that bump I talked about earlier. We have a new business partner and editor now and we're excited about that. And for those who don't know already, Mark left the company in October on good terms.

Shortly before we left for the funeral, I finished the final mix on the last track for my second (beyond) full length Escape From Saturn release titled Implosion. Implosion consists of 32 songs; b-sides, outtakes, and demos from 1996 through 2013. With a stiff drink and a dedication to Daniel, I clicked the link to publish the album on Bandcamp. You can listen and/or purchase the album here. The tracks for Implosion as well as 10 Million Ways to Say Goodbye are also available now via the EFS Reverbnation store and very soon 10MWTSG will be releasing in expanded distribution to various distributors. I'll talk more about that as it becomes available in places.


And my writing... has certainly taken a toll. I'm afraid to say that Rising from Ashes: Empire of Blood Book Three still has a little ways to go and will likely not be out until April or May. In the midst of working on RFA, late last year I wrote a 10,000 word novelette titled Through the Mindhole. I recently released it as an Amazon Kindle exclusive that is free to read for Amazon Prime account members. It's a sort of disturbing supernatural, psychological serial killer fairy tale.

I feel very strongly that it's one of the most interesting things I've ever written. And for those of you who use other e-readers than Kindle, as all of my titles are, it is completely DRM free and can easily be converted to other formats. And after this initial exclusive period here in a couple of months I'll be releasing it via Smashwords and all the various other distributors like BN, Kobo, etc.

Meanwhile, I am working on Rising from Ashes and will do my best to still get it out as soon as possible. But I won't apologize for what I could not control. I never wanted to have life get in the way and I certainly didn't want to lose my friends who were very close and dear to me. And the grieving process, for a time there, didn't allow me to do much of anything.

Which brings me back to music... Music has always been the first thing I turn to when life becomes hard to bear. Don't get me wrong, writing has been a huge source of release and helped me to deal with many things in my life, but I recently realized the huge difference between the two. For me... for writing to help me through rough times it requires a lot of work on my part. A lot of digging and tearing and scratching away the surface of something before it truly happens. With music, it's like immediately diving into the source of the pain and anguish.

So while I'll be writing Michele her own personal character in RFA, I did not get the chance to know her in real life nearly as much as Daniel. Daniel's death left a hole in me that left me no choice but to hide away and write music. I wrote the following song for him, called Project the Last (Project as a verb, like to project something outward). Project the Last was the name he had envisioned for the project we had started working on so many years ago and never finished. This was my attempt to express just how truly great of a person was taken from this world so horribly and before his time.