Jonathan Moeller's Blog, page 99

The Pulp Writer Show, Episode 97: After GHOST NIGHT, What Is Next For Caina?

In this week’s episode, I discuss what might be next for Caina after the conclusion of GHOST NIGHT.

We also talk about vintage cyberattacks and Spotify’s acquisition of audiobook distributor Findaway.

As always, you can listen to the show on Libsyn, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Amazon Music.

-JM

The 10th Anniversary of Skyrim

It’s hard to believe, but November 2021 is the tenth anniversary of Skyrim.

I’ve been playing Skyrim on and off for just half a year less than I have been self-publishing. And it took me a long time to finally beat the main quest – I only did it in July of 2020 with the Switch edition of the game, since I was able to play it while reclining in comfort upon my coach, which is hard to do with a PC.

I still haven’t played the Dawnguard or the Dragonborn expansions. Maybe I’ll finally get to those in 2029.

So here’s to ten years of enjoyment from Skyrim! There haven’t been many games I’ve played across the span of a decade, but Skyrim is definitely one of them. (And also Oblivion.)

And how many games get the London Symphony Orchestra to do a 10th anniversary concert of the soundtrack?

-JM

Weekend Progress Update

No, no, no. Not THAT weekend update.

Anyway, I’m currently on Chapter 6 of 20 of DRAGONSKULL: SHIELD OF THE KNIGHT, so about a quarter of the way through the rough draft. I’m really hoping to have it out by December 17th since that’s when the ebook platforms tend to close for year-end maintenance, but we’ll see.

I’m also about 11,500 words into CLOAK OF IRON. If all goes well that shall be my first book of 2022.

Have a good weekend!

-JM

CHILD OF THE GHOSTS Featured Deal!

GHOST IN THE SUN Is the 28th Caina book, but why not go back to the beginning?

I am pleased to report that the audiobook of CHILD OF THE GHOSTS, as excellently narrated by Hollis McCarthy, is currently a $0.99 Featured Deal on Chirp Books.

Additionally, GHOST IN THE FLAMES and GHOST IN THE BLOOD are currently $4.99 each on Chirp as well. So for $10.99, you can get CHILD OF THE GHOSTS, GHOST IN THE FLAMES, and GHOST IN THE BLOOD for over 36 hours of listening. That should cover most Thanksgiving travel, even with airport delays. Or you can put in your earbuds and tune out while extended family members argue.

-JM

After GHOST NIGHT, what next for Caina?

A few people (okay, well, many people) have asked if I intend to start another series with Caina now that GHOST IN THE SUN is out and the GHOST NIGHT series is complete.

Yes, but I don’t know what it will be about.

I have written a lot about Caina, and for a very long time now. I think I wrote the first Caina story in either 2006 or 2007, and since then I’ve written 28 books with her as the main character, for over 2.7 million words, and I don’t even know how many short stories – it has to be at least twenty. I’ve been writing about Mazael Cravenlock for longer, but I’ve only written fifteen books with Mazael as the main character, as opposed to twenty-eight for Caina.

That is a lot of books and a lot of words. It’s also a long time – fourteen years. It’s been a great privilege to be able to do it this long. I want to think for a while about what I will write next with Caina. Let it simmer for a while on the subconscious, so to speak. I’ve heard other writers talk about “refilling the creative well” and I want to let the portion of the well labeled CAINA to refill for a bit.

So when I do go back to writing Caina, I’ll want to write something new for her. It will probably be one of the seven following ideas (or some combination thereof) that I’ve been considering.

1.) Caina and Kylon go back to New Kyre.

We never did find out why the Surge summoned Kylon back to New Kyre, and I never actually did decide why the Surge tried to summon him back. Kylon has spent a lot of time helping Caina, so it might make for an interesting story if Caina had to help him with something and watch his back the way he’s watched hers for the last fifteen books or so.

2.) Caina and Kylon go back to the area near Catekharon and the Free Cities.

The Empire, when it’s not in the grips of a civil war, is very orderly and stable. The area near the Free Cities around Catekharon is much less stable. Big possibilities for adventure.

I’ve had this idea kicking around in my head for a while that Caina would somehow wind up in command of a mercenary company. The Free Cities, like the Italian city-states of the Renaissance and medieval period, prefer to fight their wars with mercenary companies, and sometimes the mercenary companies prefer to manage the wars themselves for fun and profit. (If you’re curious about the concept, read about the condottiere, the Italian mercenary captains of the late Middle Ages. Cesare Borgia was a typical example of an Italian mercenary captain, and he got speared to death by some knights he was trying to besiege, which was also a typical demise for an Italian mercenary captain.) So there are definite story potentials in that idea.

3.) Caina becomes the guildmaster of a thieves’ guild.

This could be related to #2 above, but I think that would be an interesting plotline.

4.) Something with orcs and serpent men.

Like, Caina’s world has been a human world for its entire history. What would happen if orcs showed up out of the blue one day? How did they get there? What do they want? Why are they attacking everything in sight? And why are these serpent men being so “helpful?”

5.) Cloak & Ghost.

Maybe I should write more CLOAK & GHOST books. I stopped because I got tired of all the emails complaining about the crossover and related questions – but in the four years they’ve been available, these three very short books have brought in five figures’ worth of sales. And that’s even with me giving away the three books for free a bunch of times to newsletter subscribers! So maybe I was just too grumpy about it. (I admit I was very grumpy at the end of 2018 and the start of 2019, which may have affected my judgment.)

6.) A new version of Caina in a new continuity.

I sort of did this already with CLOAK & GHOST.

The thing is that THE GHOSTS has a very specific fantasy setting – no orcs and elves or dwarves, just humans. The reason for that is back when I started writing the books back in the 2000s, all the Big Brain Energy agents and editors at the traditional publishers said that people weren’t interested in fantasy with orcs and elves and dwarves. So I wrote the GHOSTS with no elves or orcs or dwarves, and I hardly ever even use the word “magic” – we have “magi” and “sorcery”, but no wizards. Except 15 years later, my bestselling books are the ones in the FROSTBORN universe with lots of elves and orcs and dwarves, and all the traditional publishers are getting assimilated Borg-style by multinational conglomerates, who then fire all the Big Brain Energy editors and replace them with 20-something recent MFA graduates. In fact, CLOAK GAMES/MAGE has only sixteen books to the 28 of the GHOSTS, and still outsells GHOSTS sometimes, probably because it has elves and orcs and dwarves.

So it might be fun to write a version of Caina who lives in an Empire with elves and orcs and dwarves and dragons and wizards and the other traditional elements of a fantasy story.

7.) Something I haven’t thought of yet.

I cannot expound on this further because I haven’t thought of it yet.

But I want some time to think about all of this. In 2022 I’m going to focus on DRAGONSKULL and CLOAK MAGE, and hopefully another SILENT ORDER book.

So thanks for reading Caina’s adventures, everyone! 28 books is a lot of books to have read.

-JM

The Pulp Writer Show, Episode 96: 4 Reasons To Write Mystery Novels

In this week’s episode, I take a look at four reasons for writing mystery novels.

I also discuss the release of GHOST IN THE SUN, Kobo Plus, and how to properly organize an asset library.

As always, you can listen to the show on Libsyn, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Amazon Music.

-JM

DRAGONSKULL: SHIELD OF THE KNIGHT underway

Now that GHOST IN THE SUN is out, my next project is DRAGONSKULL: SHIELD OF THE KNIGHT, the second book of the DRAGONSKULL epic fantasy series.

I am 10,000 words into the rough draft. If all goes well I hope it will be out in December.

Let’s have a short excerpt!

###

“Yes, let’s go talk to Crake,” said Gareth. “We ought to take him hunting.”

“There’s no game within twenty-five miles of Cintarra,” said Philip. He turned his horse to ride south down the column, and Gareth followed. “You might shoot some freeholder’s pig, and then the Dux will have to pay compensation.”

“Not hunting, then,” said Gareth.

“Fishing,” said Philip.

Gareth sighed. “I am not going fishing with Crake.”

“Why not?” said Philip.

“Because he never shuts up about it,” said Gareth. Philip opened his mouth, and Gareth leveled a finger. “Yes, I know, I know. Crake is my brother knight and comrade-in-arms and we’ve all gone through great dangers together. But he still won’t shut up sometimes.”

“We should be grateful for that,” said Philip.

“What? Why?”

“Because how else shall we keep the mighty Sir Gareth Arban from getting a big head about all the medvarth that he has killed?”

Gareth rolled his eyes. “I thought that was your job.”

“I am but one man.”

-JM

GHOST IN THE SUN now available on all platforms!

I am pleased to report that you can get GHOST IN THE SUN, the final book in the GHOST NIGHT series, at Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon DE, Amazon CA, Amazon AU, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple Books, Google Play, and Smashwords.

A dark queen rises.

Talmania Scorneus has seized the power of the Iron King for herself and now leads her undead armies across the Empire.

Only Caina and her friends stand in her way.

And the cost of defeating Talmania might be Caina’s life…

-JM

Episode 95: The 5-Day Amazon Ads Profit Challenge

In this week’s episode, I describe my experiences with the 5-Day Amazon Ads Profit Challenge, and the useful knowledge I gained.

We also discuss Metroid Dread, Diablo II Resurrected, and the 1984 version of the Dune movie.

As always, you can listen to the show on Libsyn, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Amazon Music.

-JM

organization

Made good progress on GHOST IN THE SUN today, so I’m still hopeful the book will come out this week.

Once my brain was fried from editing, I turned to a different project: organizing my stock photo library!

This is actually more important than it sounds. I’ve been self-publishing for ten and a half years now, and in that time I’ve built of quite a large stock photo library from various sources. Previously, I used a very limited form of organizing it. I have an elaborate folder tree for managing my books (of which GHOST IN THE SUN will be the 126th) and for the last ten years I’ve been sticking the stock photos in their attached book folder. Like, if I use a stock photo for a short story cover, the photo goes into the associated short story’s folder, along with a text file storing the photo’s attribution, which is important to include the copyright page of the book.

But! I do a lot of with Photoshop now, which includes making Facebook ad images on a regular basis. Those usually combine six or seven stock photos together (like the one above) which means it’s a lot of work to click through the various folder trees to get to the appropriate stock photo. For that matter, I’ve written a lot of books and short stories, and I can’t always remember which story I used the stock photo for.

So over the past few weeks I’ve been organizing my stock photos into a new library, and it’s been very convenient. It makes designing images go a lot quicker.

The lesson here, I suppose, is that in many areas of life – writing, graphic design, taxes, and others – proper organization of files is indeed important!

-JM