Steven E. Wedel's Blog, page 3

How to Fail as an Author ToC

In my last post I told you about the book I was working on, a sort of instruction manual for writers called How to Fail as an Author. I shared the first chapter of the book in my blog. I have finished the first draft of that project!

It’s a relatively short book at about 30,000 words. It includes pictures, mostly of book covers, but you may see a few others things.

The book still needs to be self-edited, then turned over to others for comments and editing. I need to get a cover for it, for...

How to Fail as an Author

So, there I was, a few chapters into Book 4 of The Travels of Jacob Wolf, and an idea I’d been kicking around for a while came roaring to the front of my mind, suddenly fully formed and demanding to be heard, and next thing I know, I’m writing two books, one a continuation of my Old West tale of a bounty hunter and the other a non-fiction piece where I recount the myriad mistakes I’ve made in 40 years of trying to become a rich and famous author.

How to Fail as an Author isn’t my first non-fi...

Sycamore Souls finished

Late last month I finally finished the project I began in November as my National Novel Writing Month project. It’s a literary novel I’ve called Sycamore Souls. The first draft came in at a little over 93,000 words and, while it is a pretty rough draft, overall I’m pretty proud of it.

Sycamore Souls is about Kelsi Duncan, a woman in her twenties who moves from Casper, Wyoming, to a small northern Oklahoma city called Nokomis after meeting a guy online named Tucker. She lives on her own and go...

Books of 2023

I once again set a goal of reading 50 books for 2023, and once again fell short of that. I got to 26. But I did publish seven books of my own, which took away a lot of pleasure reading time for editing and proofreading. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

Last year was the year of Ivan Doig. Yeah, I’d read several of his books prior to 2023, but last year was when Doig truly ascended to the status of one of my all-time favorite authors. I read six of his novels last year (and am reading a...

A Farewell KISS

Tonight, December 2, 2023, my all-time favorite band played their last show and will go into retirement. It’s a sad day. It’s not just an ending for KISS, but an end to something that has been as integral to most of my life as electricity or running water.

I clambered aboard the KISS bandwagon when I was 10 years old in 1976. Yes, it was the costumes, the fire, and the blood that caught my attention and made me want to know more. Keep in mind, there was no internet, no YouTube or TikTok where...

NaNoWriMo 2023

Happy November, everybody! I realize we’re 20 days into the month already, but this is my first chance to update my blog, so here goes …

I’m participating in the National Novel Writing Month again. This is my fourth year to do so. Past years have produced Mother, Yes or No, most of First Born, and this year I’m working on another literary novel called Sycamore Souls. I don’t want to give away too much about this one, but I’ll say it’s an idea that hit me like a truck early this year and has b...

Return of the Beast

Twenty years ago, the now-defunct 3F Publications released my debut novel, Shara, which soon became part of The Werewolf Saga, and for a while I enjoyed the status of “the werewolf guy” among horror authors.

Ten years ago, to make sure my dealing with Scrybe Press would end, I killed off most of the Saga’s primary characters in Nadia’s Children, a book I ended up releasing under my own MoonHowler Press imprint.

I thought I was done with werewolves. But I was wrong.

Nadia’s Children cl...

The Lost Pages Bookstore Grand Opening

Tomorrow, August 1, 2023, is the birthday for what I feel is the best novel I’ve ever written. Sure, writers say that about all their newest books, but in this case I really mean it.

This novel was begun in 2018, a little while before my divorce was finalized. By the end of that year, I was divorced, unemployed, and had closed on a house the day after I lost my job. I spiraled into a deep depression and stopped writing.

I hated myself. I hated what I had done to my marriage, to my kids, ...

The Broken Man

Yesterday was the book birthday for my novella The Broken Man, which is the first book in the series The Travels of Jacob Wolf. I’ve already talked about it a couple of times here, so instead of yammering on, here’s the synopsis, followed by a little excerpt.

After being sent away by the girl he thought he was going to marry, young Jacob Wolf is ready to throw his life away in a blaze of glory at the first opportunity. However, his death wish gives him nerves of steel and he finds himself un...

Trusting the Muse

On Tuesday I’ll release another new book into the world. The Broken Man is my second Western. It’s just a novella, only a bit over 20,000 words, but is the first in a series called The Travels of Jacob Wolf. This post is kind of about the new book, but it’s more about the writing process. Please stay tuned after this short advertisement.

The Broken Man

The Travels of Jacob Wolf #1

MoonHowler Press 2023

After being sent away by the girl he thought he was going to marry, young Jacob W...