Coming soon

The Prodigal Girl is done

Greg Owen #3, The Prodigal Girl, is done. It's available for pre-order right now and releases one week from today, November 24th.

If you haven't, ahem, had an opportunity to meet my latest character, Greg Owen, here's your chance. These books are fast and fun, just as character-driven as they are plot-driven. People have told me they're actually funny too. I do try. Below are some passages that readers have written me about.

SOME BAD LANGUAGE BELOW (you've been warned)

Let’s get this out of the way.

My name’s Greg Owen.

At least two of these three things are true—I’m:

Tall.

Dark.

And handsome.

It takes forty-five minutes to reach Johnsonville and then another five to find the state penitentiary. It’s a little after noon now, so I call the pool hall just to make sure Wally and Roy haven’t burnt the place down.

“Greg Owen’s Den of Inequity,” somebody answers.

“Who the hell’s this?”

“Oh, hey, Greg. It’s Bernie.”

Of course Bernie, the freeloader with about eighteen tabs all across town, manages to show up the one day of the year I go with the honor system. 

I head back in, my head swimming. Becca and I share a nice dinner with good conversation, but I can’t stop thinking about Denise and Nick and the past and how Denise and I are falling right back into our old patterns of behavior. I’m the guy she comes to when she has a problem. She’s the girl for whom I inhabit that weird intra-space between friend and more than friend.

But hey—

That doesn’t stop me from inviting Becca back to my place.

Let’s get this out of the way—

My name’s Greg Owen, and there are three kinds of people in this world:

Those who are good at math.

And those who aren’t.

“You know, Greg,” Bernie begins, taking a break from his book, “boys and girls mature much more quickly these days than—”

“Shut the fuck up,” I say.

Bernie shuts the fuck up.

“Hey, guys,” I call out. “This is Lucy Hale, soon to be an Olympic athlete.”

Roy and Wally put down their cues and meet us at the register. Bernie’s jaw is still slack, his mouth wide open. He is in awe of this woman.

“Hi,” Lucy says, a touch shy.

“This is Roy and this is Wally.” I gesture at the two. “They fight like they’re married. But don’t let that fool you. They actually love each other.”

They smile and shake Lucy’s hand.

Roy says, “Greg has a lot of faults.”

“Gee, thanks, Roy.”

Roy continues, “But being oblivious isn’t one of them. You’re in good hands here.”

Wally nods. “He doesn’t eat well, or dress well, and his businesses leave a lot to be desired, but Greg is a good guy.”

“Stop selling me, guys,” I say, laughing.

Roy and Wally keep up with the jabber, so much so that Lucy is in stitches. Bernie’s mouth is still open, like a Venus fly trap.

“And this is Bernie,” I say. “He’s hard at work on a novel.”

Lucy smiles and offers her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Her physique and pretty smile have robbed Bernie of the power of speech. Miracles do happen. Completely flustered, he shakes her hand.

Before his gaping mouth and wide eyes get even weirder, I say, “Hey, Bernie, could you get Lucy a bottled water?”

“Red or white?” he asks, and we laugh at this. Bernie hasn’t even realized what he’s said.

11/9/17 and 11/10/17 Updates

In the last two days, I've written ~12,000 words. Total word count is 19,634.

I was trying to get to 20k last night but just got too tired. People have asked me what the secret is, and like with all magic tricks, the secret is kind of a let-down once you know what it is.

Finishing a book simply comes down to making the time. Ass in chair. The more your ass is in that chair, the more you write. Sounds too simple to be true, right? But that's how it works. Some days I'm more productive in 2 hours than I am in 4 hours, but for the most part, the more I'm in front of the computer, the more I will get done.

There have been days where I feel like I have nothing left to say, but still I sit down in front of the computer. If nothing comes, I think about the story in general. My mind usually drifts to the 3 or 4 really big scenes I've already planned for, and I grow excited and want to get back to work so I can get to those scenes. Sometimes all I have to do is ask myself how I can make the next part of the book the most exciting chapter ever. I resist the urge to put the laptop away or turn on the TV. Eventually I start writing and once I start, it's easier to keep going than it is to stop.

Wyetgerd's Ax is coming along nicely. The hero has "accepted" the call to adventure (right now he's doing it for the wrong reasons) and his decision will get him involved in a much larger conflict. From there, his problems escalate and, somewhere along the way, he truly accepts the call to adventure.  This change of character from reckless, self-destructive youth to young man willing to stand up against evil was one of the things that drew me to the story. The other was the initial hook.

The more I think about it, maybe that's all I need to get excited about an idea. A strong hook and a character that develops over the course of the story.

Sounds too simple to be true, right?

***

Thanks to everybody who downloaded The Stalked Girl during the promotion on Thursday. I hope you all dig it. Please make sure to tell 10,000 of your closest friends about the Greg Owen series.

What now?

Over the past month I've built up a lot of writing momentum. Writing is inertial, so rather than take some time off I've decided to pivot immediately to something else.

I've mentioned this before, but earlier this year I wrote a psy thriller, The Young Woman Next Door, that I wasn't crazy about. While working on The Bastard's Refuge, a few ideas came to me that would make the psy thriller so, so much better. So that's what I'll be working on this week. The changes will only require a few days to make. If I keep pushing, The Young Woman Next Door should be ready to launch in November.

I also want to finish book 3 in the Greg Owen series, this one's called The Prodigal Girl. I just put it up for pre-order on Amazon. Here's the cover:

I don't want to give any details away about the plot, because EVERYTHING is a spoiler.

Last but not least, I'm exploring marketing options for The Bastard's Refuge. I want to launch that story in November but I need to build some anticipation for it before I do. I've got a few different ideas ;-)

The Lost Available for Pre-Order

UPDATED

The Lost is the second book in my paranormal thriller series featuring Eddie McCloskey. It's now available for pre-order on Amazon HERE. The book will be released on 9/28/14. Here's the blurb:

Fourteen years ago ... Tessa Lovsky and her friends played a dangerous game on an icy lake. When the ice broke, no one could save Tessa from drowning. Before she went under, Tessa said she would kill them all.

Five years ago ... Eddie McCloskey’s brother was murdered on their last paranormal investigation. Now Eddie, who swore off ghost hunting, faces the biggest case of his life.

Now ... Marty Kindler, heir to the local gentry, claims the whole town is haunted. Either this is the find of the century, or it’s all a hoax. Only Eddie can piece it all together.

But Eddie better hurry, because someone is trying to kill the people who were on that ice with Tessa all those years ago.

The Lost is approximately 80,000 words and is specifically formatted for Kindle, with an active table of contents.