YouTube - Media Death Cult, Moid Moidelhoff.

Moid Moidelhoff has a YouTube channel he calls Media Death Cult. He states this is the greatest Sci-fi community on YouTube, on the internet, in the world, in the galaxy and in the Universe.
Personally I’ve not fact-checked this claim.
Moid, devotes his channel to Sci-fi movies and books, with the odd drift off/stand-alone video about David Lynch, albums, whatever. As Moid explains, it’s his channel and he’ll do what he wants.
Excellent, that attitude gets my vote. So here is the May Blog written 6 June.
One word of warning for those of a more sensitive nature, he does swear, not a constant stream but…

Having said all the above Moid does review Sci-fi films, TV series and books. People seem to like the top ten lists and book hauls so he slips in a few of those too.
Anyway, why the long ramble about someone else’s YouTube channel?
Well, in his book hauls if a self-published writer sends in a copy of their ‘Sci-fi’ novel he will show it as part of the haul. Don’t get over-excited he isn’t going to review or even read the novel but he will hold it up and give out the title.
All of which leads us to the Media Death Cult book haul video of 27 April 2021.
I watched the video on the day but our story starts before then. There follow a few spoilers for the video and my surprise/stupid idea so run off watch the video first then come back and read the rest of this drivel.

You back? Good. So the story of Moid’s Media Death Cult book haul video of 27 April 2021 from my perspective.
As a self-published author, I’d purchased about four/five copies of my two novels to hand out to interested friends/family etc. Then I learn something. Having completed both novels submitted them to KDP and the world I sat to read and enjoy my books. I was working on a killer robot story at the time but read for relaxation. I enjoy reading a physical book between working from home on a laptop and my hobby of writing, sat at home on my laptop.

When not on the laptops I will often watch YouTube, mostly as research for the topics I’m interested in. ‘How to guides,’ that sort of thing, (see the last blog for more.) Plus for historical research. Currently researching Victorian England. This period of history has always bored me before but as a writer, we develop strange search histories. Quite often, we want to know how certain poisons work, where are the headquarters of the C.I.A. or N.S.A. And so on.

Reading my ‘author copy’ published novel, purchased via KDP I relaxed. Before long I grabbed a highlighter pen and began to mark up mistakes I spotted on this read-through. I learnt a valuable lesson, one that I may have picked up sooner from Kate Cavanaugh, (see the last blog for more details,) if I’d have found her sooner. You can edit till you are blue in the face on the screen but print off your manuscript and a whole new viewpoint is established. The well-hidden errors wave frantically from the page. If you write on a laptop, edit on a laptop, I recommend you try printing off a copy for a final edit. If you have published to KDP already, don’t buy loads of your book to give away, you only need to purchase one copy to highlight newfound mistakes. Least that’s my experience.

So now I’m sat at home with a selection of paperback books I know are faulty, poor quality, substandard, pick a word, other options are available.

What to do? So in my hours of watching YouTube, I enjoy watching Moid’s Media Death Cult videos. I love the faux shambolic style, the “like your Mom,” jokes. And then this guy, who I should add enjoys a bottle of whisky or whiskey. (There is a difference.) Will feature self-published books in his book haul. Think about that, it’s free advertising on YouTube! I’m jumping on that bandwagon.
But wait, why would I send him a substandard version of my book. I’d not got around to editing and resubmitting a new version so… What to do? The clock was ticking, soon he’d be uploading a new book haul. Time for action.

Further back in time, as a kid, I remember a movie or TV prog, where a guy hides a handgun in a book. Carved a rectangle out of a book creating a box with a lid, Genius. Add this to the above and we can see a plan forming. I went in search of small bottles of whisky to hide inside my novel.
How clever is this? I send Moid a substandard version of my book but cut out the pages to hide a whisky bottle inside. Win, win. I mean he was most likely not going to read the story anyway but you don’t want people thinking you are a complete chump.

I found a bottle of Famous Grouse that fitted the purpose, a tad bigger than I wanted but it was an option. I searched a while longer but time wasn’t on my side and I don’t tend to buy spirits nowadays. Should have gone to the internet sure but I wasn’t even sure what I wanted. In the shop, I took rough measurements of the bottle with my thumb. (Yeah total professional all the time here folks.)
Back in the day, I used to enjoy Famous Grouse it was in my experience the best available to me. But I’ve never had the pocket to develop very expensive tastes so…
Anyway, bite the bullet, purchased the bottle. Happy days it fitted inside the book, just. The first book I carved open was a bit of a disaster but luckily I had a couple of spare substandard books still. What good fortune! I still have one left if anyone what’s a paperback as an ornament.

I packaged up the book/bottle combination/abomination and headed off to the post office. I got in the queue and horror. Behind the nice lady in the shop was a shelf holding a selection of smaller, would have fitted much better, cheaper, bottles of whisky. That’s where they had been hiding.
Too late! I had destroyed a perfectly good substandard book, purchased a bottle of whisky I wasn’t going to drink, packaged it up. Stuff it. I continued, paid the postage, grabbed my receipt and left.
I walked back to the car and drove off. Driving home the voices in my head started, they normally point stuff out after the event. In essence, the voices said, this was a stupid idea, “crap,” a complete waste of time and money. Moid was used to a finer blend of whisky than the stuff I used to drink. “Well done you’ve embarrassed yourself again. Why do you never stop to think?”
I should just drive into a deep hole and hope the world fills it in.

27 April 2021 – The Media Death Cult book haul video. Minute by minute. Yeah because this blog isn’t overlong already.
Video kicks off with new graphics and a thrash metal intro. Epic!
Moid starts fussing about the lights. On the table next to him, are two piles of books, a two-stack and a three, the spines are turned away from us. I’m transfixed on the screen, clearly, none of these books are mine. “Yeah, stupid idea, bottle in a book. Stupid, stupid, stupid.” The voices are back.
Moid explains he hasn’t been book shopping yet but here we are with a haul.
One minute: 34 seconds in: Moid tabs the pile of three and says, “self-published stuff.”
Mine’s not there. Epic fail.
One minute: 50 seconds in: Moid explains the video will be in three sections because he has four, “count them, three.” He said four. Heart rate goes up, adrenalin spikes, all attention is focused on the table of books while a back and forth dialogue whirls around my head.
“This is stupid, how old are you?”

Almost seven minutes in and Moid is talking about some John Wyndham books he found out in the wild. Seven minutes: 10 “let’s do the self-published, stuff. I got four.” “count them, three.”
Seven minutes: 48, first one is, “Martian Oddities.”
Twelve minutes: 25 Seconds. “Right,” says Moid.
“Here we go.” I’m laughing, excited, this experience is so stupid.
“Last but not least,” Moid reaches down below view.
He brings into sight the parcel I sent. This is surreal. That box was in my house the other day, lying on my living room floor, surrounded by numerous flakes of paper. The result of attacking a book with a Stanley Knife. (Box cutter for the Americans.)

Twelve minutes: 41 Seconds. Moid reads my letter. My smile is breaking my face.
The book is staying in the box for reasons to be explained but I already know. Image of the book comes up on screen. Just wow.
“This is stupid, how old are you?”
If you watch carefully as Moid holds up the book you can just see the bottle top, top of the book.
Moid shows and explains what I’ve done. I am sat at home laughing. This is going so well, better than the voices ever expected.

Fourteen minutes: 15. Moid explains he can’t read the book because there are no pages just this gimmick. What Moid doesn’t know is I’m still fighting with KDP to get a new edit, with improved cover art uploaded and ordered. A copy arrived 6 May.

Fifteen minutes: 26 seconds. On with the video proper now. Oh, what fun. Haven’t laughed so hard in an age.
If you read this far, thank you. Hope you enjoyed the blog. Do check out Moid’s Media Death Cult if you like Sci-fi or amusing YouTube videos. Until next time. TJ.


P.S. For any self-published fantasy writers out there, there is a chap called Rob Hayes who runs a website. He will feature your fantasy novels. Details of how and why available on the website.