Steven E. Wedel's Blog, page 3

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...

3 New Covers

In my monthly newsletter that went out yesterday I revealed three new covers for upcoming books. Today, I want to share them, with a bit of description, on my blog.

The Broken Man

The Travels of Jacob Wolf #1

A jilted lover is ready to throw his life away at the first opportunity of heroism to show the girl who broke his heart that he could amount to something. It’s up to an ex-slave bounty hunter to show young Jacob Wolf that there’s more to live for than a glorious death.

This is ...

Late May Update

So, I’m officially retired as a teacher. It’s been a week out of the classroom so far. I thought I’d have a lot more written by now, but I’ve mostly been working on formatting The Saga of Tarod the Nine-Fingered, which is up for pre-order now. Amazon’s KDP won’t allow pre-orders for paperbacks, but the places served by Draft2Digital have the paperback. The e-book is available everywhere, and I’m thrilled to report that Ken O’Brien is on board to narrate the audio book (he’s done several of my pa...

Foray Into Fantasy

The first novel I finished writing was The Prometheus Syndrome, a horror novel you can buy here (it was not my first published novel). My second finished book was another horror novel called The Living Dark that has never seen the light of day. For my third novel, I decided to write a sword-and-sorcery fantasy that had the pulpy feel and action of Robert E. Howard’s yarns mixed with the epic story arc of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth stories.

The Saga of Tarod the Nine-Fingered was cl...