I’ll be doing my best this week to keep the posts rolling, but I’m in the middle of moving from Wiesbaden to Kaiserslautern. I’ll still have possibly up to a month and a half of driving back to Wiesbaden until my organization moves, but even though my commute will be taking an additional two hours out of my day, I will be in a much better place to write. Yet even with everything happening in my personal and work life, I am still working on the story line to complete the last quarter of Destiny, Book Two.

By the way, I’m listening to some Warpaint while I write. I heard this song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bVwOMFrvJI “Love Is To Die” Sunday night when my wife and I were finishing up watching the “True Blood” series. We both really enjoyed the story. A friend I met from writing suggested I check out the “Elf Child” and how they aged for some ideas for Frostbrand and Starfire. Definitely gave me some good ideas I’m still formulating for the story. I’ve been listening to some of Warpaint’s other songs and I’m loving them. Some really good music with hauntingly beautiful melodies.  

I had an interesting review today. Even though it was only a three star review due to my grammar and need for a professional editor, the reviewer was honest enough to say that he still thoroughly enjoyed the story, which is high praise from a reader who finds such errors difficult to cope with. Not that I disagree with the comments on grammar/editing, but I’ve done the best I could with the limited budget I had available for the project. I can only do my best to make this better for Book two. I’d like to address one of the last comments the reader left here, because I think it could be on multiple readers’ minds.

 Why didn’t Startüm Ironwolf transform into a Werewolf for the final battle between him and the Pit Demon? I thought this was a really good question. Although it seems like it would have been a perfect spot for Startüm to transform, I’m saving this for bigger and badder monsters. The “Destroyer” in Book One is actually only a Demon Knight within the echelon of Demon society. In the stories to come there will be more for of a need for this and a reason as Startüm learns to embrace his Werewolf’s Bloodline. This will actually occur on his eighteenth birthday (calculated by Irlendria time). I will say this transition is coming, along with several others, but I wanted to make sure it was at the correct spot within the story arc in an appropriate climatic scene. I needed room for Startüm to grow into his power.

Some people have commented that Startüm is overpowered, but in actuality he is not in comparison to the Paladins that came before him, and he will need everything he has and more for the enemy he will be facing in the future. During the Great War against the Tuonellian’s, the armies of the Alliance of Aurenko were only able to stand against the Hordes attacking their World by the power of the Klavikian Paladins. Only thirteen in number, these holy warriors of Ukko were able to resist the Demonic Evil that the Priestess of Loviatar wielded and keep the Alliance Armies alive to stop the overwhelming forces sent against them. Now with the Klavikains destroyed, Startüm is the only Paladin left to hold back the new Tuonellian invasion that now threatens Irlendria.  

Lastly, the Winter Gaming group has started a little earlier than expected. Although the start date is still November 15th, there are a number of us that have started playing. I’ve actually leveled my first character in years to 15 in preparation. Of course it’s a Paladin =D If you’re playing, you can shoot me a message on Darknovia on Hyjal Server. I’m only play around two days a week, due to the need to get Book Two out, but I’ll be playing for a couple hours in the evenings on Tuesday and Thursday. You can join the online guild here: http://www.audiovideodisco.org/

I had a really great idea for the cover for Destiny, Book Two of the Last Paladin Series, and then I realized that I wouldn’t be making it to the part I’d initially planned to end the second at. I know it’s very common for writers to make covers for their books that have nothing directly to do with the story, but personally I find that extremely annoying. I love to see the vision the writer had of the main character or some important part of the story.

Unfortunately that means the cover I’ve been planning to use for Book Two, even before Book One was finished, now isn’t relevant to the story within its pages, since that part of the story will now be pushed to Book Three. That sucks to such a high degree of suckatude that I cannot even begin to express my annoyance. If you’ve never tried coming up with a cover for a story that captures the essence of the characters/action/story, looks good on the front of a paperback book cover (you have to plan for the smallest possible size), looks exciting/interesting and is overall good enough to encourage writers to pick-up your novel, out of the thousands of other books available, to read the back cover, then you understand how unbelievably difficult this is to do.

Seriously, the goal of any cover is to be good enough eye candy to encourage readers who are into the genre you’re writing about to pick-up your book and check out the back story. It’s your primary form of advertisement before everything else. Your second and third primary forms of advertisement are the back cover snippet of your story and the front inner flap excerpt. These show the readers your writing style and the general concept of your story, hopefully getting them to read the sample Amazon and other websites offer. At this point you’ve sank your hooks into them, metaphorically speaking. You’ve pulled the reader into your world and hopefully they’ve enjoyed the experience and will come back for more.

So back to finding a cover for Destiny, recently I’ve been letting my mind wander as I write the last quarter of Book Two hoping to come up with a new concept that will fit my requirements for the cover. As I’ve talked about before, usually as I write I run through graphic images I’ve pulled out specifically relevant in one way or another to the current story I’m working on. Most of the images are from Deviant Art’s website. I might see if what the artist has in regards to posting his works on other websites or even if I can ask to be allowed to share his work, but first I have to find where I originally pulled the image from.

Anyway, the image is from the Ultramarines: Warhammer 40,000 universe. It’s an action shot from the perspective of the enemy attacking a group of Ultramarines that just rocks. I was thinking I could use the concepts and layout the artist did for this shot for something relevant in my own story. The scene would be in a large cavern. The viewpoint is if you were the attacking enemy charging the group. Picture a large stone statue of a gorgon reaching up to the sky (or cavern ceiling) in the middle of the scene, near the base a large Minotaur warrior in legionnaire armor holding to two enormous double-headed battleaxes shimmering with magical power and is in the process of turning to face an oncoming enemy. Picture ornate chest armor, shredded billowing cloak, armored shin guards over black hooves and elbow high metal gauntlets. Back-to-back with the Minotaur is a modern NATO soldier caught in mid-turn with their rifle swinging around. Maybe she’s a female sergeant with short hair and her helmet off. Lower in front of them are maybe two more modern soldiers, one injured laying on their back with the other shooting back over their shoulder as they try to drag the injured away from the oncoming enemy. Another Minotaur is in the front right of the picture falling backwards with one arm slice off at their upper arm, while the other has a fist spike weapon. Lastly on the left side of the screen are two more Minotaurs rushing up with a large shield in one arm and a fist spike in the other.

I’m still trying to picture the scene. It can’t be too much or it won’t display properly on the cover size allowed on the site. What do you think? Does the scene sound interesting? Would it catch your eye and encourage you pick-up the novel to see what the story is about? Do I need to go back to the drawing board and try for another image?    

The story for Book Two of the Last Paladin Series carries on the ongoing struggle of Startüm against his people’s ancient enemy. There is no place left to hide, the Tuonellians now know about Earth and the situation on Irlendria is quickly deteriorating as the enemy’s long term plans turns the Alliance of Aurenko against itself. While a large portion of the story focuses on the growing evil that once again threatens to destroy the races of Irlendria, the story on Earth proceeds further as Humanity races to discover more about the enemy that invaded their world.  

I know that this is a VERY brief rundown of the general story arc for Book Two, but I felt that it was necessary to discuss the various titles I have been going through in my head. The lists of my first choices are below:

Destiny

Revelation

Descent

Discovery

Exposure

For now Destiny is at the top of the list, although Revelation and Descent are close runner ups. Destiny fits many of the characteristics of the overall storyline, and has the added benefit of being a highly searched name due to the new Destiny MMO that Microsoft recently released. Although that was not part of my initial thoughts when I was choosing the name, but after a couple friends of mine pointed out this additional benefit. It has made Destiny my planned name for Book Two for all of these reasons. Descent would have also been a preferred title in my mind. I’m partial to Descent due to an old video game that had the same name. Descent was my first love within the realm of first person shooters. Also, it has the added benefit of fitting the story’s theme in many ways, unfortunately out of all of the friends I run things like this by, the title was not well received : / Although, I am still interested in having discussions on possible names with anyone who is interested =D Feel free to comment or drop me an email.

For those of you who haven’t noticed, I prefer one word titles for books. Partly this is because I really loved how R.A. Salvatore did his naming conventions for his Dark Elf Series. Titles such as Homeland, Exile and Sojourn are so powerful and simple. I know there are many other writers who have done this with good results, but since the Dark Elf Trilogy is such a powerful story. I’ve been greatly influenced by his writing and the choice of titles in my own books.   

When I started writing Book One of the Last Paladin Series, I was really having difficulties deciding where to start the story at. Since the world of Irlendria has so much history there were many places I could start the story from, but I wanted an Urban Fantasy novel that mixed in Real World and a Magical World. That desire to have both made me decide to start Flight with Startüm on Earth.

I’ve received some criticism on how quickly I started the story out. While the story if fast paced and fun, there were people who wished for a little more back story on Startüm, and rightly so. To be honest, in a way I look at Flight as being the “Star War’s” of my series in the sense of how you are introduced to everything going on in the middle of Startüm’s story.

With Book Two, this will be a lot different. Partly this is because my writing ability is that much better and I am more confident in keeping the action flowing, while giving readers a deeper appreciation of the characters and their cultures. While Flight was about fun and action, Book Two has those same characteristics and much more. I really love the depth of the story.

A good example of this is with the new species and characters being introduced into the story. Legatus Tiberius Decius Lupus, prince of the Minotaurs of the Imperium is a prime example of this. I really wanted to make his culture come alive and give you a depth of his honorable character that is so much more than the beasts so many people think of when they hear the word “Minotaur”.

Nessa Manitou, Centaur of the Great Plains, is her own person with a very distinctive culture. Her people are very different then the Minotaurs of the Imperium. Her beliefs, magic, culture and viewpoint of life come to life. She is much more than just a traditional Centaur from Greek Mythology. The pains of her heart and her loves have a suffering that I believe many readers will be able to identify with.

Also, the Elves in Book Two are similar yet different to the Fantasy we all know and love. Growing up on stories and concepts of D&D and Lord of The Rings, Elves for me had a spectrum of flavors. Wild, Forest, Gray (High) Elves were distinctive and unique in their own ways. I’ve added my own twist to their cultures and story, but without a doubt my past influences flavor their cultures strongly. Lúthien Narmolanya, Enelya Tasartir, Warden Morwen Telemnar and others are distinctly  different between one another, but at the same time very Elven.

Just thinking about the story and talking about it here gets me excited all over again, so back to writing.         

Even though this was a short week I’ve managed to squeeze in several more novels from John Conroe’s Demon Accords. An amazing series btw if you’ve hadn’t checked it out yet. I’ve had a couple friends point this series out. This weekend I’ll be sure to give Mr. Conroe some well deserved reviews for his writing. Since I’ve started writing there is never just a “pleasure read” so to speak.

It’s not that I’m not fully enjoying the writers I talk about in my blog, but there are really important examples of how the writers have done something in particular that I’m also researching. It’s one of the best things about writing. I can research and learn while enjoying great stories. Gotta love that!

What’s really interesting about John’s main characters are that they are so incredibly overpowered. For those of you that have read Flight, then I expect you can understand my interest in how he handles his characters stories. I know some people might instantly think that an overpowering man character would make for a dull story, but that’s entirely not the case. No matter how powerful you are, there are always things that make you vulnerable. Also, I just enjoy the raw power of the main character and how it's welded into an incredible plot line. I take my hat off to John for his amazing stories. As enjoyable as the “Good Intentions” series is, the Demon Accords are just as good. Although not at the same level of eroticness they are definitely worth reading.

Just in case you were wondering, the answer is "yes". I was also researching the different levels of sexual/eroticness between the stories to assist in my own learning/writing of my own stories romantic scenes. My ideas are definitely falling somewhere in-between these two writers flavors.

For those of you wondering how I can write and read in an evening, I tend to finish off most normal sized books in around six hours or less. Yea, we are not talking about Wheel of Time books, those just give me a headache because it takes me like three or four sittings to finish a freaking book, although great stories. So far I’ve been faring better when I read first and write afterword, since the reading will keep me up to 4 in the morning, but the writing I’ll go to bed by 1. It means I get a little more sleep for my work day.

Right now I’m working on the Elven part of my story. All of my characters are there in the middle of it, so it’s like not “ALL” Elvish, if you know what I mean. But there is so much culture involved that it keeps my mind working full time on getting the flavor where I want it to be while bringing the world to life. It would have been easier to just make one species of elf, but in all of my time playing D&D or reading Fantasy. Just having one type of elf didn’t seem right, hence why I have three distinctive Elven cultures in the story.

Anyway, it’s time to get writing tonight, so I’ll blog again another day.          

So I’m off Monday and Tuesday this week, which means family time. Even so, I wanted to share some quick thoughts I’ve had on writing.

I’ve heard a lot of questions from people on different forums questioning how to deal with writers block and thought I would throw my two cents into the mix. So far in my short time of writing of two and a half years I haven’t really run into this, but not because I haven’t shared that feeling that so many other writers get. I think this is because of how I plan out my stories and how I deal with that initial “writer’s block” feeling.

I’ve read many articles on writing styles. The two main agreed upon division lines are that people a planners or creators. Planners typically plan their whole world out ahead of time before they write, while creators make up the story as they go creating everything on the fly. I myself do both when I write a story. This flexibility I think helps me deal with situations where I could be hit by writer’s block. Typically I do a whole outline for the individual book I’m sitting down to write. In some spots this outline can be extremely detailed, but mostly for me it’s just the general flow of the events of the story, main plot lines I’m planning on following and approximately where I want my book to wrap up at when I write “The End”.

Another thing I do to help deal with “writer’s block” is to just start writing the chapter I’m struggling over. This can happen where I’m struggling with how to start a certain chapter or I’m struggling on getting the correct flavor. Just writing the general thoughts down that I have in my head, even if it flows terrible, is enough to get me started. It breaks me out of that jammed place I’m stuck in and then either I continue onto the next chapter or I go back to the place I was stuck in and start tweaking it until it flows right. Actually either way I end up going back to it to fix it up, but it doesn’t have to be right away. Usually when I go to sit down to write I read the chapter before to get pick up the flow of where I was at and many times I start smoothing out that rough chapter. So far I haven’t been forced to completely re-write one of these chapters … well not entirely. Sometimes you don’t know if something is too much or too long until you get it down on paper and have your friends check it out.

Lastly, I find a lot of ideas from watching TV Series, reading my favorite authors and watching Movies, along with looking at digital art from graphic artists across the web. Even from friends as we discuss different plot ideas for the story. I usually keep my mind open to different ideas and ways to flavor my own story and make it better. Many of these ideas help to add to my current story outline to make the individual plot lines more detail and realistic. This is not stealing ideas. Your ideas in your head are yours and yours alone, but you can always pick up additional concepts to enhance your story and characters within it.

Okay, that’s about it. My family is chomping at the bit for me to get moving, but before I go, I want to make one last comment on World Building. I am no expert on how many writers fall into each category and I know many “world building” writers that takes years upon years to create their world and then have moved on to become very successful, but I find this very hard to do solely. Much of my worlds are build from dreams I’ve always had over my life, and although these different worlds have been with me forever. I have not sat down and actually created the world in detail. I tend to do this when it is required detail for the story. This even includes adding in non-main characters. I consider them similar to extras in a movie. There are many times that you run into characters that you need to pull up and give brief detail to flesh out the story, but it is not something you need to plan down to the last remote detail before you ever sit down to write your story. I am so careful about “NOT” doing this, mainly because I love story planning. I have spent years planning different aspects of words that I like, but then I never actually simply write the story. I think this can become a trap for many writers. We get so hung up on the details that we never actually take that first step and begin writing. As I write my stories I have discovered that suddenly in a scene I need a squad or two of soldiers, or maybe I need three squad cars with an officer in each. Unless they add something to the overall story, I don’t worry about documenting their characters in the story, unless it’s needed. Also, many of your characters take on their own life in many ways that you have to tweak parts of your story to fit their growing character development. Planning that ahead of time is not always possible.

Ha, well not a short “one last note”. Talk later…

I'm trying to get back to doing two updates a week again on the blog. Preferably I would like to get back to three updates a week, but between work, family, writing and life I’m not sure if that’s possible. But it’s always good to have goals, right =D

Here are two characters that I’ve had a lot of fun with and have pictured from the very beginning of the story. I hope you like the brief history of the Elven Races on Irlendria that comes with them: 


On Irlendria there are three distinctive groups of Elves that make up the Elven Kingdom that resides within the Great Forest. Although they all live the same general domain, they live separately from one another, internally dividing themselves into Clans: Gray Elves, Forest Elves and Wild Elves. Albeit when referring to themselves, most Gray Elves consider themselves High Elves, a title of pride left over from the Great War. Because it was Daeron Fortress, the Gray Elf ancient home, that stopped the invaders when the Tuonellians sent their hordes to destroy the Elven Race over forty-seven years ago. 

While both Gray and Forest Elves are xenophobic to the other races of Irlendria in the extreme, they respect one another and work closely together due to their mutually shared philosophical perspectives on the evolution of the Elven Race. Unfortunately, this commensal relationship does not extend to the Wild Elf Clan. While the Gray and Forest Elves did work closely with the Klavikians at the onset of the War and even altered their metaphysical beliefs to stand against the Tuonellians, the Wild Elves have never left the core values that their race was founded upon. This adherence to the old ways greatly weakened the Wild Elf Clan’s effectiveness during the Great War and caused a rift between them and the other Clans.   

This brief history of the Elven people I thought was somewhat necessary to explain my next characters from Book Two, Enelya Tasartir and her soulmate Argus. Enelya is a Spirit Shaman from the Wild Elf Clan. She has an animal companion named Argus, which she calls her soulmate due to the spirit-link they share. While the spirit-link enhances them both, their lives are linked together from this bond. If one dies, so then does the other.

Argus is from a race known as the Wenci, which are apex predators within the Great Forest. The Wenci families are formed into Packs that hunt and live together in small communities with the Wild Elves. Although their bodies are long and slender with short legs, they are large enough to act as temporary mounts for their Elven Companions. The Wenci naturally have incredible dexterity and are armed with long claws and sharp fangs with hides that are protected by thick fur coats that combine to make them tough aggressive fighters.  

Okay, well maybe not such a “quick update”, but I can’t help it once I start writing!

It’s been a crazy week at work and at home, between the two I’ve missed my normal blog posts. I decided to get a quick post out before I went to the movies to see Lucy. For those of you who haven’t seen the trailer, it’s here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVt32qoyhi0 I hope it’s as freaking awesome as it looks!

Wednesday nights are our movie nights at the Taunus Theater. You can find it here: http://www.shopmyexchange.com/ReelTimeTheatres/Movies-Wiesbaden.htm Although not much of a selection, it’s still a nice theater for those of us serving overseas. The next two movies I’m waiting for are Guardians of the Galaxy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89q_HH-3ghk and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZZ0PnDZdZk

Hey don’t judge, I know I’m a geek =D

I’m still trying to decide on a title for Book Two. Hopefully my next post will have the top four Titles that I’m struggling to decide on. I’m hoping I can get a vote as to what people like best and then decide based on everyone’s feedback.

I will also be posting my experience on the process of getting a new edition of Flight’s printed edition up on Amazon. Although I update the Ebook whenever I hear of an issue someone found within its pages, I haven’t updated the printed edition. My wife just had a friend want to give her husband a copy for his birthday and I was horrified when I’d realized I hadn’t updated that version yet.

Until now updating the printed version hasn’t been an issue. People typically buy Ebooks or Audio books, but rarely does someone actually buy the printed edition, which is why I’ve been somewhat lackadaisical on getting it corrected. Now if I had my books in bookstores across the world and in the airport this would have been a priority, but since I’m and Indie Writer it hasn’t been top on my list. Well now my wife has properly motivated me to update the printed edition too.

My daughter just had her eighteenth birthday party this last Monday. Although this was the small party for her girlfriends since it was a school night, the girls danced and sang until 0500 in the morning. I think I passed out sometime around 0230 from exhaustion … not drinking. It was entertaining to hear everyone singing and dancing though.

I’ve also been working with my daughter on learning to drive. She’s doing awesome with the learning the manual and I’m really proud of her. I think it’s always smart to be able to drive any car, no matter if Google is trying to make knowing how to drive obsolete =D You never know when you’ll be stuck somewhere trying to escape a Tyrannosaurus Rex and the only vehicle available is some manual transmission jeep. Sigh, my daughter rolls her eyes at that, but I know some of you know what I mean.

I had a fan named Nic ask me when I’m planning on having Book Two out, and I’ll post what I told him. If RL allows me to finish Book Two in 2014, then I’ll have it out this year, but if not then I’m planning on the first quarter of 2015. While Flight was 88,040 in length, I’ve already written over 65,000 words of Book Two. Although that sounds like a lot, Book Two is turning out to be a lot bigger story than I’d originally planned. I know where I want the story to end at, but as I’m writing the story I’m discovering there is a lot more story then I’d realized and I have no desire to skip over the details. I’m doing my best to get it out as soon as possible though and I normally write a little every night … except on the weekends. My wife has nixed any writing on the weekends after Book One was released. 

Eitherway, Book Two is turning out awesome. I really love how the story is turning out and I hope everyone who reads it feels the same!

I’ve said this Series will have four books, although that doesn’t mean the story is over. I already have a second series planned that picks up where The Last Paladin Series stops. The planned name of the next Series will be “The Demon Wars”. I had originally thought this was a spoiler … and maybe it is. Once you’ve read Book Two it will make more sense ^^

Also, I have two prequels planned for the Series. One will be the stories of the Paladin Ilmarinen Ironwolf and his Werewolf wife Novastar Ironwolf (Startüm’s parents), which will cover the Tuonellian invasion up to their death. The other Series will cover Startüm’s life on Earth.  

After writing back to Nic I just decided I had to share the information with everyone who checks out my blog. Again, thanks for letting me know how much you liked the story Nic. It made my day!

Anyway, I think that’s enough of an update for now. I’m going to try to get a little bit of writing in before heading out to the movies.

Larissa Evans is a thirty-two years old Archaeology. She holds a Ph.D. in Archaeology, Anthropology and Linguistics and has spent the majority of her life studying cultural, physical and linguistic anthropology, focusing specifically on ancient and classical civilizations of the Mediterranean. Although she is recognized as a world renowned Archaeology and Linguist, her height and looks has made it nearly impossible for her to be taken seriously among her peers within the male dominated field of Archaeology.

While her model height of one point eighty-seven meters (6' 2"), small waist and large chest has time and again caused her considerable problems throughout her professional career, her sharp mind and extensive knowledge of ancient civilizations has allowed her to excel within field archaeology. At the age of twenty-six she turned down a Professorship of Classical Archaeology at Oxford University, once she learned that Jowettney and Newtonian were the current electors. Larissa adamantly refuses to confine archaeology to the classics, which has put her at odds with her academic peers. Instead she accepted a position as the Keeper of the Ashmoloean Museum.

Her Father, Sir Arthur John Evans, was her motivation for going into the field of archaeology. His death when she was fourteen years old left a hole in her life. Still, even in death her Father’s many professional connections and her in-depth knowledge of ancient civilization has enabled her to succeed.

For those of you interested the audio book for Flight, it can be found
here: http://www.amazon.com/Flight-The-Last-Paladin-Series/dp/B00LIAUVCI/ref=tmm_aud_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1404911218&sr=8-1 
I still need to see if I’m allowed to give out a copy for Christian who
won the Goodreads Book Giveaway contest. I promise I’ll look into that. 
 
Just so that you know, the audio book’s price is set by Amazon since I went with their production process, so it costs as much as any audio book does. For those of you who like audio books, I will say it's definitely worth the price. Alex Edward Trefethen did an unbelievable job with the story.

I hope the audio version does as well as the Ebook, so that Alex will be open to doing the second book in the series. Since honestly I can’t imagine hearing the story with anyone else’s voice.